Losing Neverland
by PenguinsWillReignSupreme
Summary: It has been over two and a half years since James Potter last saw his parents and for a very good reason. They might be family, but they certainly are not fools, and James must realise he's not Peter Pan, before he loses more than just his morality.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Title credit goes to Molly (SnitchSnatcher) over at HPFF

* * *

**Losing Neverland**

The train rattled ahead faster than he might have liked. The wheels screeched, the steam billowed and outside was nothing but hazy fog. He was used to that; things not adding up and memories different to that of three, four, five, six years ago. Who said that two plus two equals four? As far as he was concerned, two plus two wasn't even a number. It was a way of life. It was step by step and leaping and backtracking and seventeen thousand, five hundred and sixty-three hours since he last remembered adding two and two to make four.

It was a bit odd though. Going home. Family. Hugs and kisses that might mean something. Tears over his presence in the morning not his absence. And oh, would there be tears. Strops and tantrums and screaming and fighting and brawling – all over one boy, one man who had never and would never grow up.

The train picked up speed again and in a flash of sunlight behind a rising hillside, he saw one moment of a bird swooping down on a rippling lake. A monstrous thing, it dipped into the water with more grace than he could ever dream of and in a second, re-emerged with a beak full of a struggling fish, before it lifted out of sight again.

And the train continued to race.

It jostled him in his seat and the leather covering slid him up and down. The gentleman opposite him – complete with a bizarre magenta bowler hat and monocle without glass – glanced over and shot him an offended looking scowl. He shot back an arrogant smirk that only he had perfected of a lip twisting upwards and narrowed eyes and quizzical brow. His sister had tried too many times to copy its nonchalance but to no effect. Oh, he would love to see her try it when she saw him. Disdain was key to the lip twist, and disdain was certainly what she must have had for him by now.

"Twenty-four minutes to Temple Meads. Twenty-four minutes."

The sound of the voice projecting down the racing train jolted the pair of them out of the staring contest and the younger man smirked. Grabbing his bag, he pulled out a scrap of parchment and a Muggle pen he'd found on his travels. Without much thought, he scrawled his message in his laziest handwriting and stood up on the seat to grab the owl cage which was rattling above his head. Pulling it down, he freed the tiny owl – nothing more than a ball of fur, really – from its container and quickly tied the letter to its leg.

"You know where it's going," he murmured, pulling open the window and squeezing the tiny bird through the gap. It hovered for a second before zooming out of sight and he collapsed back in his chair, relaxed. "Listen, mate, you got some sort of problem with me?" he added as the hat clad gentleman stared him down again. His jaw set, the elderly man shook his head slowly. "Good man. Glad to hear it." Then, tucking his hands behind his head and his feet up on the opposite seat, he leant back. "Glad to hear it."

**

"No, no. Louis, get _down_. How old are you? Oh, Lily, no, don't be stupid, go inside and help your grandmother."

Ginny Potter's voice had lost the majority of its usual vitality, sounding far into the realms of apathetic exhaustion. Weddings were many things but stressful was top of that list, especially with a guest list the size it was. Relatives and step-relatives and relatives neighbours and friends and friends' families – the lists went on and on, then on a little bit more. The sound of almost screeching laughter inside gave her a fairly strong inkling that the work she'd assigned the supposedly now mature children to was not going quite to plan and she groaned.

All of them twenty plus, or nearly there, and yet they still managed to make a hash of everything they did. Straightening chairs and chair covers and rearranging ribbons around the place was the least she had expected, in all honesty, from having Louis, Al and Lily put in charge of laying things out. Dominique's wedding would be the second in a year, and yet they still hadn't learnt the art of charming the ribbons to flutter _calmly _and feeding the plants three times a day to keep them fresh. How she'd even managed to get herself to be the Mess Remover of the afternoon shift was beyond her, though was aware it was probably down to her mother.

Finishing the decoration inside the marquee, Ginny stepped into the June sunlight and waited a moment. Silence. It should have been golden but no. It was stunned, broken and peaceful though it might have been, there was an underlying reverberation of 'not right' and 'too quiet' racing through her. Her stomach pressed against her skin and her breathing was a little off. As she got closer to the house, the silence became hushed whispers to loud protests to a scream of petulant "NO!" and then she was there.

Harry turned to face her, chewing his lip and glancing down at the letter clasped in his hand. She moved to take it off him but the click of a beak distracted her first. Sat on Al's shoulder, pecking at some treat that the youngest Potter boy was feeding it was a tiny ball of fur. An owl. His owl. Beryl, the owl. She snatched the letter without a second thought:

_Get the champagne out. James is coming home._

Every face was the same. Each read plainly the same message as the cry that Ginny now realised had come from her daughter.

No.

* * *

_A/N: Very short chapter, I am aware. Later ones shall be longer but I think adding to this would ruin it a little._

_Entire story dedicated to the ever wonderful Molly at HPFF. I love her to bits._

_Chapter 2 coming soon, I hope.  
_


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: Showdown.**

"Who invited him?" Lily demanded, glaring around at Louis who looked momentarily like a rabbit caught in a blinding headlight. He stuttered and stammered and shrugged as the tiny girl grew closer and closer to him, far more menacing than his own siblings, which really was saying something.

"Lily, leave him be," Al said, grabbing his sister's wrist and tugging her away. "He's no wiser than we are about this."

"Was it Dominique?" she demanded, turning on him now. Far more used to her behaviour than Louis, he merely pushed himself off the wall and walked away. "Al!" He said nothing in response to her childish outcry and stepped outside.

He half-expected her to follow him into the garden but she seemed to have rounded on Louis again instead, judging from the meek reply that the man was trying to formulate in response to the unheard question. The adults had relocated to the marquee, and their voices were vibrantly animated as he passed them. At least there were no tears, but over the years enough people had sobbed over James that maybe they'd dried out for him now. He certainly wasn't ready to think about falling at his brother's feet as the eldest probably would expect him to.

He dropped to the ground by the pond, cross-legged, and pulled at the nearest bunch of reeds. Gently, he ripped a strand off each, watching it curl in on itself in the heat. He felt his own snigger rising up his throat and he shook his head amusedly. James was back. He hadn't said when or where or how or why and he hadn't expected him to. The thing about James was that he liked to believe he was spontaneous. Al preferred to see him as reckless, thoughtless and an all round prat, and most people would second that given half the chance.

The sunlight was just beginning to dip into the thick lines of clouds. It felt closer than before, beckoning him with a strange allure and charm. Specks on the pond's murky surface caught the pinkish shimmer and it danced across his scarred hands like the pirouette of a butterfly, balletic and graceful.

"You okay, love?"

His grandmother's voice was mildly expected and he turned to smile up at her. Twenty-one and meek as a newborn kitten, he found his way slowly to his feet and nodded.

"I'm fine, Nanna," he assured her, placing a warm hand on her forearm. She covered it with hers and squeezed it gently, in the comforting way that only she seemed to have on him. "Are Mum and –"

"Shook up but aren't we all?" she chuckled, almost dream like. Ginny's anger had been quelled and Harry was still in an almost stupor, walking a little like he'd just stumbled through fourteen ghosts at once, but they had been iokay/i, as things go. Molly turned them around and they walked without thinking up to the house. "I never understood your brother much, you know? He always had such a big heart –"

"And a big head to go with it, Nanna," Al added, bitingly. She patted his hand and smiled.

"He's a good lad."

"I bet people said that about Voldemort too," he muttered, releasing his grandmother as they reached the back door.

"Albus!" she scolded, watching him wipe his feet vigorously in what she assumed was some attempt at proving something. He turned slowly and stared at her in some vague anticipation for a rollicking. "Don't say that in front of your dad." He laughed and held his hand out to help his grandmother inside and she winked at him, a strip of her youth momentarily revitalised.

"What are you two giggling about like a pair of naughty school kids?" Ginny prompted, her hand running back and forth across her forehead. They looked around and shook their heads, a chorus of a guilty 'nothing' coming from their mouths as if they really were both childhood friends as opposed to grandmother and grandson. "Anyway, Mum, we're off," she said, sliding off the worktop she was sat on and kissing her mother's cheek. "I assume he'll be waiting at home."

"Be good," Molly warned, grabbing her daughter's hand as Harry bent to kiss her goodbye as well. Neither said a word. "I'm serious. I'm not coming to bail you two out of Azkaban." Their faces lit up a little bit and they nodded compliantly.

"Coming?" Harry asked his son, who was mooching around by the sink. He shook his head. "I don't blame you. Lily's gone to Louis'." Then without another word, they made their way to the fireplace and disappeared into the emerald flames. Silently, Molly and Albus looked at each other.

"I'll make us some tea," murmured his grandmother. She tried to ignore her shaking hands as she filled the kettle with water and she tried even harder to pretend that she was not looking forward to seeing her eldest grandson once again. It would not do to defend him against those he hurt the most, the ones who she had to piece together again. No, it would not do at all.

-::-

The train pulled in as expected at thirty-four minutes past six. The sun palpitated tiredly in the sky as James emerged from the hidden wizarding platform, soaked in steam that the rest of the station hadn't seen for many a year, and into the busy Muggle station. Suited men and struggling mums hurried past with briefcases and pushchairs and bags galore. He hoisted his backpack higher onto his shoulder, tucked Beryl's empty owl cage closer to him and pulled the trunk he'd found abandoned at King's Cross after him. The strange array of luggage caused a few eyes to turn but he slipped into the open air with little trouble.

With little direction, he wandered until he found himself down a fairly deserted alley between a music shop and a solicitor's office. He dropped the cage – deciding there was no real need for it anyway as the stupid bird only went nuts when closed in – and pulled the trunk as tightly into his grasp as possible. Apparating with items wasn't usually his specialty. In fact, Apparating at all wasn't amongst his strengths, having Splinched himself more times than he'd care to admit to.

And so he was as surprised as ever to find himself with all limbs attached in the right place, and no significant facial features missing. The edges of the Potters' grounds were unchanged, relatively. New flowers and bigger trees and a new gate marked the two years and seven months since he'd stepped foot outside the house and he tried to ignore the swell in his stomach as he thought about how much it had changed. It didn't really matter, did it? Yesterday was long gone. Shattered remains long buried deep into molten soil. It was gone and it would remain so.

"Roses for Lily and lilies for Rose."

His words were stencilled on his tongue and they tripped over his slightly overlong teeth with soothing familiarity as he pushed open the gate. The gravel underfoot was like the ripping of a fairy's wing from its back. Sickening.

His key still fit the lock. It was an odd comfort, that. They were waiting on his return. They expected a return. It almost made him want to turn and leave but he couldn't. Not just yet. He couldn't carry on the way things were. He needed to gain a bit more, faster than last time. He needed security and then could leave again. That was all he was there for, after all.

The piles of shoes by the front door had disappeared, only stocking a neat pair of heels and battered trainers which he assumed belonged to his parents. Lily must have moved out by now, Al certainly had and the place seemed no different. Dumping his things in the living room, he threw himself down on the sofa and tucked his feet up neatly onto the coffee table. Stretching, he rolled onto his side and then swung up and off the chair. Restlessness had always been a downfall of his. He wandered around the living room, lifting up magazines and papers and opening drawer after drawer to try and find something to amuse himself. His fingers – light as they were long – flicked through the interior design magazine that someone that was not his mother had abandoned down the side of the sofa. The boredom of ornate bed frames and shining silver chandeliers grew faster and faster and he threw it heavily down on the table.

His hand grabbed out for a small folded card that his action had breezed into view. Wedding bells swinging back and forth over the front, he flicked it lazily open.

_iMr. and Mrs. William Weasley request the honour of the presence of Mr. and Mrs. Harry Potter at the marriage of their daughter Dominique Gabrielle to Mr. Matthew Bell on Tuesday 22__nd__ June, 2027 at two o'clock. The ceremony and reception will take place at:_

_The Burrow_

_Ottery St. Catchpole_

_Devon_

_R.S.V.P./i_

"Dom's getting married," he slurred, turning the card over. "Dom's getting married on Tuesday. That's a turn up for the books." He tossed the card down on the table and shuffled into the kitchen. His eyes crossed the room swiftly, searching out one sole target. His eyes locked onto it and he yanked the bottle across the worktop. Grabbing a mug from the draining board, he sloshed half the wine into the mug, wiping up the spillage with his finger, and gulping at it almost hungrily.

"Hem hem."

The smash of the mug hitting the floor made him jump more than his mother's noise. Torn between leaping for the door, leaping to his parents or leaping to the floor to see what he could salvage of the drink, he opted for leaping backwards.

"Clean that up, now. And not with your tongue, for Merlin's sake," Ginny hissed. "Then living room and clear your stuff out."

Hands clenched around the oven handle, he cocked his head to the side as though he half expected them to burst into peals of laughter. Anyone else might have picked up on the death grip that his father had on his wife but James merely glanced between the two of them and pulled out his wand, Vanishing the mug and then smiling as though to say 'Right, joke's over.'

"I'm not kidding, James. Get your stuff and get out."

The only person who could stare him down, he cracked and turned to his father, equally stony faced but trying not to look directly at his son's blue eyes.

"But I've got nowhere to go!"

"You should have thought of that two and a half years ago," his mother snapped, breaking her hand away from Harry's to step forward. He made no move to stop her, and though she only came up to James' shoulders, it was enough to make him flinch. "Now. Get out and don't even ithink/i about going to your grandparents'."

He stared at her one last time, one last chance at breaking her, then shook his head and stormed from the room like a teenager who couldn't get his own way. Ginny turned to look at Harry who was just as dumbfounded as she was, and offered a hand out to her. Trying to make her lips turn upwards, she stepped towards him and let her husband pull her closer. He murmured into hair, the only words reaching her ears being, "…right thing."

The way her heart didn't sink when the front door slammed shut told her that, for once, he might be right. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: Hypocrisy**

The last person that she had expected to roll up at her door was James Potter. The word had spread quickly, though, probably reaching every family member in less than ten minutes. But for Hermione Weasley to open her door and see her godson looking not at all ashamed, sheepish or pleased to see her was certainly not on the cards. Fighting the urge to both slam the door in his face and hug him intensely, she instead opted for the stringent parent and crossed her arms tightly across her chest.

"Yes?"

"Er, hi."

"We've done that bit," she said, glancing down to her watch nervously. "What do you want?"

"Mum won't let me stay at home and I was wondering whether you'd got a spare bed?" he managed to force out after he'd unknotted his tongue and, more to the point, his brain. Begging and pleading was far from his usual line of business.

"Right. And what makes you think iwe/i are going to give you a bed?" she hesitated. "And if you use that silly i'because you love me'/i nonsense, it's a straight no."

"Just for the night, Aunt Hermione. Please?"

"Better." The word had been forced from his mouth, she was well aware of that from the twist that his nose gave as he wrinkled it in mild disgust. She stepped away from the centre of the door and grabbed his trunk. "Merlin, James, what have you got in that? Did they not teach you a lightening charm at school?" She groaned as she let the case drop to the hall floor and turned to see him shutting the door after them. Plunged into what was now just a strange isolation, they had little to say to one another.

"Where's Uncle Ron?" James prompted, unable to hear any trace of his uncle in the house.

"Work," his aunt replied, turning her back on her nephew and walking back into the kitchen. She bent over the steaming pan, prodding whatever was inside with a knife before replacing the lid. It rattled a little and then calmed, the only noise in the room the gentle bubbling of boiling water.

"On a Sunday?"

"Dark wizards don't take days off and nor do Aurors."

Her clipped tone was almost hard to ignore. She'd put what Hugo called her i_Annoyed Phone Voice/i _on, slow and perfectly formed consonants cutting short just a split-second before her normal tone. She sank into the chair by the stove and looked up at him. He'd filled out since she'd last seen him. At twenty, he'd been just shy of fitting his build perfectly. His face had thinned out, his eyes widened, his shoulders broad and stomach three steps too far away from being toned. Now, getting on for three years later, he looked like nothing of the boy/man/lad that she'd watched grow up. No, now he was a man and he was in control and it was, frankly, terrifying.

"Do you think he'll –" James trailed off, nonchalance bordering on worry and that would certainly not be a wise thing to give away.

"Furious won't cover it," his aunt said. "What you did borders on despicable, okay? In fact, it probably crosses the line into disgusting. The only reason I'm letting you stay is because in spite of that, I don't want to see you on the streets."

Silence. Not even contemplative, it was almost bored, almost ignorant. He nodded his head at the right places, forced his lips down, but that was not going to change his opinion. He was not ashamed of what he had done, merely angry that it had not quite worked out the way it should have. He should not have been begging for a shelter. He should not have been wandering around with his tail between his legs looking like he didn't belong.

He did belong.

He had to.

"You can have Rose's room. I'll explain to Ron. Have you eaten?"

"Sandwich on the train," he responded, standing up and tucking his chair neatly under the table. She didn't reply, but turned out of her seat and back to tending the stove. He watched her for a moment but she made no other move and after checking his wand was in his pocket, he trudged back into the hallway.

Hearing the door clicking shut, Hermione turned around. The faint stubble across his chin, the bored, empty stare that looked straight through you as if you were made of the finest, thinnest crystal. He was a man in everything but mind and he needed to grow up.

Fast.

-::-

Rose's room hadn't really changed since she was a teenager. White walls plastered in pink stars that he remembered Lily colouring in one summer, it was a girl's room through and through. A towering wardrobe that he was sure would still be full of clothes from the previous decade, too small but too adorable to throw out to the rubbish, stood proudly against one wall, the bed opposite. He dropped the trunk in front of the wardrobe doors, the floorboards groaning in protest, and threw his rucksack down beside it. His trainers – far past their best – scuffed against the floor and he kicked them off with such luxurious freedom that the fact that one muddy sole was against the impeccably clean skirting board barely even registered as he flung himself down on the double bed.

"Roses for Lily, lilies for Rose," he murmured again as he glanced around more. He twisted and turned his body on the mattress, lying still almost as big a problem as sitting still. The photo collage that his cousin had made in the break between fifth- and sixth-year had been removed, the only trace of it ever existing being the tack marks on the wall and the trace of a memory as he tried to fix the puzzle pieces together. Jigsaws were always easier if you had the picture in front of you to copy. They would be easier again if he could look past the cloudy film that was slowly overtaking each part of his ability to recollect even a snapshot of a moment.

He didn't know how long he'd lay there trying to work out whether the star on the wall opposite had always had a black edge or whether it had been a later addition, but the sound of a man's voice roaring through the house soon snapped him out of it. Like a child caught in the midst of a juicy bit of playground gossip, James leapt off the bed and crept to the door, twisting the handle so he could hear better. Calm, for now. He couldn't make out what they were saying but Hermione's voice was placid and soothing and that could only mean that the explosion was yet to come.

Nothing. Not a single raised voice or yell or crash of plate meeting floor or wall. Hard to believe didn't quite cover it. Clicking the door back into place as the sound of china softly clicking down on the worktop drifted upwards to him, James collapsed down onto the bed. The full length mirror that stood in the near corner of the room caught his eye. Around the edge there were black marks, each one a different shape, size, shade. His brow furrowed as he tried to remember, just for a moment, what used to be there, what Rose used to frame her reflection with.

No good.

Grabbing his wand from his pocket, he first rustled his hand about in his rucksack, finding a last bottle of Turkish Firewhiskey and packet of dodgy looking cigarettes that he'd bought from a woman with a rather striking beard. He unscrewed the lid and lit up a cigarette then tapped the trunk with the tip of his wand. The clicking of locks sliding in and out of place lasted far too long and once it had finished, he scrambled to lift it open.

Clothes. Clothes. Clothes. Deodorant. Clothes.

The exasperated groan drew itself from the very base of his throat and he pulled at the dozens of robes that filled the case up. Not so much as a Knut was rolling around in the bottom, and the only thing possible to consume was a bottle of greenish liquid that smelt strangely of three-day old lettuce.

"James, can I come in?"

In his hastiness to shove the clothes – at least two sizes too big for him – back into the trunk, putting out the cigarette before his aunt could see it didn't even feature in his mind. The door opened as he slammed the lid shut and stood up, swaying a little with the influence of the drink.

"Put that out now," she said, pointing to the thing between his lips. "And give me that." She held her hand out for the bottle which was swinging loosely at his side like a hapless sidekick and he stroppily let her snatch it from him. "You need to get your act together."

"Sorry."

"No, you're not," she corrected though didn't lecture him on it. "I've spoken to your uncle. You can stay here until Friday. After that, you'll have to leave."

"Why?"

"We're not being the bad guys in this debacle. We're giving you five days to sort yourself out. Find a friend, a flat, anything." He said nothing but gave a small nod, looking over to the window where the sun had grown a purplish colour now and then back to his aunt as if to ask what she was still doing there. "I've brought you dinner." She placed the plate and cutlery on Rose's desk. "I was going to offer you a drink but I think you've had enough, don't you?"

With one last pointed look at James, she left. As she walked downstairs, she glanced to the bottle then up to the ceiling. The question didn't need to be asked.

-::-

"…is he there?" was the cry that James was woken up by the next morning. Only in his boxers and lying on top of the pale pink sheets, he rolled to grab his watch off the nightstand. Half eleven. He rolled again until his body lurched and his feet hit the floor. Grabbing his jeans and shirt, he pulled the door open to hear Victoire's voice – decidedly less shrill than in their youth but still firm and unyielding – racing up the stairs.

"He needed a place to stay. I said he could stay here."

"Nobody else would have him," Ron interjected and James couldn't help but wince a little. Buttoning his shirt, he shut the door and crept downstairs, the voices still for a moment.

"They'll go mental when they find out, you know that?" Victoire said, and he could almost visualise her stood there with her short blonde bob and hands on hips. His hand rested on the kitchen door and plastering his best morning smile on his face, thrust it open.

"Vicky, Vicky, Vicky!" he exclaimed, grinning broadly and throwing an arm around her shoulders. "Fancy seeing you here, kid." She writhed away from him and looked almost pleadingly to her uncle who did nothing but turn around and pick up his mug of tea. "Suit yourself."

"Victoire, just go and do what you came to do and then go back to your Nanna's," Hermione said, not taking her eyes off James who was glancing somewhat nervously around the room. Victoire glanced between each of the three and left in a fairly impressive flounce. "I tipped it down the sink." His eyes narrowed and he felt his mouth drawing into a pout. "Breakfast was two hours ago. Maybe you should go and have a shower then try and find a place to stay at the end of the week."

"Can I at least have a drink? Coffee?"

"No milk, no sugar," Ron mumbled, sipping at his own mug.

"I'll have it black, then."

"No coffee," he added, looking at his godson then to his wife, who had started flicking through the newspaper on the desk.

"Mature, Uncle Ron," James snapped, sending one last pleading glance to his aunt who didn't so much as flinch. He shook his head in mild disgust and left, ensuring the door slammed shut behind him with impressive finality.

His aunt and uncle looked at each other, the word lingering in the air between them, unspoken.

Hypocrite.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: Gossip**

Victoire grabbed the dresses out of Rose's almost empty wardrobe and slung them over her arm. She'd kicked an exceedingly heavy trunk out of the way (with some effort) and spotted four cigarette butts stubbed out across the white washed furniture, and was tempted to set light to the rucksack that was propped up on the chest of drawers. He barely deserved to even have a bed to lie on.

"What are they for?"

She glanced up to see James, in all his oddly adult glory, leaning on the doorframe. She glanced to him, pushing her hair out of her face.

"You don't know?" she prompted. He shook his head and she shut the wardrobe door. "It's a party. Some of my friends."

"Bit posh, isn't it?" he asked, peering at the clothes bags as she pulled them tighter to her. "Keeping them out the dust for just a party?" She said nothing. Not because she did not have an answer but because of the gleam in his eye, the gleam of green in navy blue. The gleam that should not have gleamed at all but it shimmered nonetheless. A wink. A silent acknowledgement. Knowledge superior to her expectations.

"You know."

Not a question. A steadfast, certain statement and the words trembled in the air. His eyebrow cocked up in that untouchable, insufferable way that only James could manage and it read 'I know' and 'I have no idea' at the same time. His tongue teased itself around the front of his teeth.

"Know what?"

And she was trapped. With a glare that embodied contempt itself, she scowled and left. James didn't move a muscle until the front door slamming shut shook him and his laugh tripped from his mouth.

**-::-**

He must have thought she was stupid. His ridiculous contagious laugh followed her through the front door and down the drive to the edge of the property, even if it hadn't trickled out of his mouth yet. Compressing the dresses against her stomach, she slammed the gate shut behind her and checking for any straying Muggles, Disapparated.

Her feet landed her within view of the orchard that obscured all but the peak of the cream marquee erected at the foot of the garden. She slipped through the gap in the hedge and Banished the dresses inside with a lazy flick of her wand. They zoomed away, flying through the back door and she could almost hear the satisfied click of coat hangers lining up on the clothes rack at the bottom of the kitchen.

"You look stressed." Lily's matter of fact voice burst out of nowhere and Victoire twirled on the spot to see her cousin with her wand in the air, charming bells onto the tree branches around the marquee. The blonde felt her cheeks heating up and she shook her head, pulling out her wand to help. "Oh, thanks."

The redhead's toothy smile flashed in her direction at the same moment that she tucked her wand away, collapsing onto the ground with a gentle thud.

"Have you heard?" she asked, picking at the grass at her feet. Dry mud slipped beneath stubby fingernails and Victoire glanced down concernedly.

"Heard what?"

"About James?"

"What about James?" She could feel her voice trembling in her throat but continued to set the bells on the branches, the ribbons tying in neat golden bows smiling to the skies. "Lil?" The redhead sighed a sigh of a girl who felt like the weight of the world was resting on her slim shoulders and Victoire frowned. Her cousin was regularly melodramatic, but her slumped posture and the way she was chewing on her lip gave away something else.

"I'm not meant to tell anyone," she murmured, tugging at another clump of grass. The hardened mud dug into her fingertips and Victoire lowered her wand and sat down opposite her.

"Then why did you bring it up?" she asked, placing her hand over Lily's and forcing her gaze up.

"He's back."

"I know. I've just seen him." The plan to lie, to pretend she'd known otherwise and put on a look of feigned shock, had fallen apart at the sight of her cousin's hand lifting to wipe angrily across her cheeks. Lily was many, many things but a crier was not one of them. The redhead turned away, a sheet of poppy red hair falling over her cheeks. "Why?"

"Dunno," Lily shrugged, her voice deep in her attempt to put the tears at bay. "Haven't spoken to him. Don't want to." Victoire nodded slowly, pulling herself up again. She lifted her wand and hung another set of bells onto a branch. "Did Dom invite him?" Lily rose to her feet and pulled out her wand too. The blonde turned and shrugged.

"Do you want me to find out?"

Lily didn't need to reply. Victoire had already started to walk to the boundary of the garden.

**-::-**

Stepping through the open front door of her sister's mid-terraced cottage, Victoire was greeted with a shrill cry of, "-wanted _pink_ not _puce_, you _imbecile,"_ and she cringed with pity for whichever poor sod had made the last error he might possibly make. Following the sounds of Dominique's wailings, she found herself in the kitchen.

"Brilliant. _You _deal with this daft mare. I'm going for a fag," was her welcome, before the redhead turned on the spot and disappeared out of the back door. A helpless looking teenager with greasy black hair and a flatter body than an ironing board turned around clutching a small bouquet of flowers in her hands, and Victoire sighed, running a hand over her forehead.

"Two minutes, love," she said to the girl, who looked on the verge of tears. Stepping onto the cracked patio, Victoire perched on the upturned plant pot beside her younger sister and followed her gaze down to the dandelion growing out of one particularly large fissure in the stone. Wilting in the unnatural July heat, it looked almost grotesque, twisting around on itself in an unnatural fashion like a broken bone.

"Is it that fucking difficult to get a fucking colour scheme right?" Dominique muttered, twisting her watch around her wrist, the smoke from her cigarette drifting under Victoire's nose and she wrinkled it in disgust.

"I don't know. Is it that fucking difficult to keep your cancer risk to yourself?" the blonde retorted, giving her sister's arm a shove. Dominique scowled and tapped the ash off the end of the cigarette, pulling it back to her lips for another drag.

"Never used to be a problem," she replied, though turned her head away to expel the smoke this time and stubbed the cigarette out on the wall behind her, dropping it on the slabs. She stretched out her arms, leaning her head back on the wall and groaned. "What are you here for anyway?"

"Concern for my sister's welfare, perhaps?" the blonde suggested. "Or for the welfare of the poor sods who stand in her way." Dominique opened a closed eye to glare at her sister before sitting up straight again. "Okay, fine. I'm not going to beat about the bush. Did you invite James to the wedding?"

"James?" the younger woman said with such distaste and disgust that it would be hard to believe they were related. "What the fuck do you take me for, Vic? Of course I didn't. I wouldn't even know where to find him." She glanced to her watch. "Fuck." She got to her feet and wiped the back of her jeans swiftly. "I've got to go. Can you sort out that daft cow?"

Victoire bit back reprimanding comment that she had stored on the tip of her tongue and nodded, following her sister inside. The florist was still stood in the middle of kitchen where they'd left her, and for a moment, Victoire thought Dominique was going to punch her but she merely grabbed her jacket off the back of the chair and sent the girl a scathing glare before disappearing out of the front door. The blonde sighed and turned to the girl – who was looking more pathetic by the second. "Right. What's the problem?"

**-::-**

James spun the hat he'd found in the bottom of his backpack around on his forefinger. His gaze was somewhat blurred as he strode through the town, his walk lacking purpose and destination, even effort. He seemed to move like he was being blown by the still air, twisting and turning with little concern for where he ended up. The spare change jangling in his pocket was useless; all spare Knuts and the odd Euro, and there was nothing in the town to even begin to interest him.

With a groan fuelled with boredom and petulant irritation, he fell onto an empty bench opposite the bank, the smell of freshly baked sausage rolls and jacket potatoes fluttering under his nose temptingly. He threw the hat back onto his head brushing strands of mocha brown hair out of his eyes and away from the thick rimmed glasses that rested on the bridge of his nose.

This was _not_ how it was meant to be. He was meant to be in control. He had planned every moment out. His mother was always going to be the challenge, Lily too, but he had expected tears first, arguments later. The way she looked like he wasn't even worthy to grace the sole of her shoe had made him feel sick. Superiority complexes weren't something he tolerated well.

"- two _fucking _weeks it took me! I told her, mate, I said 'you ain't my kind of girl' but would she listen? No, she went all clingy on me and look where she is now, sobbing her little heart out in Mona's office. Daft bint."

The conversation of two suited business men led the pack of suits and briefcases that were swarming up the high street. Shimmering grey jackets slung over their arms, pristine white shirts glowing in the sun, they seemed endless. Women in pencil skirts putting a whole new meaning on the term _sexy secretary_ followed in teetering heels. James didn't need to think about it twice. He stuck on his swagger and tagged on at the back. When the brunette with the laddered tights held the door of the pub open for him, he smirked: every time.

Her name, it turned out, was Mia. Twenty-six, an underwriter, very, _very _single. Her red lipsticked pout made the men's wallets open without a word, the trail of her fingers down their arms made them pull out another tenner and pass it through her hands. A heavy wink in reply made them hiss at each other like overexcited school boys.

"Easy," she murmured to James, tipping back another mouthful of the new drink. He drained his pint and smiled. "So, you new?"

"Not as such," he replied, twisting his hands around the empty glass. He didn't need to look up to see her cocked eyebrow. "I know my way around town, if that's what you mean." Her hair rustled against the neck of her blouse when she nodded.

"The house is empty, if you want to go back to mine?"

Her tone was light, playful, bordering on sultry. He could feel the alcohol taking effect under the cool exterior and glanced from her to the guy with arms like a gorilla and a face to match across the bar. His mouth twisted up into his favourite smirk and he closed the ever decreasing gap between him and the girl. His lips on hers gave her the answer she needed; his hand on her thigh merely a double confirmation.

Hand twisting into hand, they left.

"So, come on, why have I never seen you before?" the brunette murmured later in the day, tucking her hair into a makeshift ponytail and pulling his shirt tighter around her slender body as he rose from the nap he'd fallen into. He groaned, sitting up and pulling the remainder of his clothes towards him, tugging his boxers and trousers on and ruffling his hair.

"Living with my aunt and uncle for a bit. I'm not in my parents' good books."

He swung off the bed and crept up behind her as she tucked stray hairs behind her ears and swept her fingers under her eyes, dusting away bits of mascara she'd rubbed off upon her own awakening. His hands slipped around her waist and he rested his chin on her shoulder, kissing her cheek and smiling. She turned in his grasp and raised her eyebrows.

"And why might that be?"

He held her gaze for a moment, eyes drifting from neatly arching eyebrows to tight lips to the mirror where he could see his shirt barely covering her lower body and back to her dark brown eyes. With a wink, he released her, tapping his nose with one finger before dipping his head back down to peck her lips.

"Can I have my shirt back? I'd best get going."

She didn't argue with him, merely grabbed her dressing gown from the back of the door and slipped his shirt off her back. Faintly stained with the smell of her Givenchy, he pulled it on and made to kiss her again.

"No, best not," she muttered, ducking away and pulling the belt of her gown tighter. "Let's not pretend you're coming back." He said nothing, merely nodded in a complete understanding of what she was saying, and left. Rolling his sleeves to his elbows, he shut the door of the flat quietly behind him.

The 'morning after' conversation wasn't quite as bad as he'd thought it would be. Perhaps he ought to have tried it sooner?


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five: The Invitation**

His stomach rumbled and the twenty pound note he'd nicked from Leah's (Tia's?) bedside table was burning against his thigh. The sun still glowed in front of him and the pubs he passed were empty, save for the regulars in their flat caps and vests, supping at ale with as much taste as rainwater. His skin was starting to glisten with sweat from the uncharacteristically hot summer and he ran his hand over the back of his neck awkwardly. The clock on the town hall swung around to half past the hour. Back to the house it was, then.

He smirked. It almost felt like he had a curfew and his body was torn momentarily between submission and ignorance. To give in, admit defeat, cower before them, or to show them that he was not going to change for them, because why should he?

His stomach rumbled again, louder this time, and he groaned. It wouldn't go amiss to have some properly cooked food in his stomach. The gurgling was becoming painful and the smell of a barbeque from a nearby house only made it worse. Scuffing the front of his shoes across the pavement, he turned the corner and wandered past rows of neatly mowed lawns, football goals set up on evenly paved drives, the screams of children as their fathers sprayed them with the hose. He smiled, but he wasn't sure why.

The gate of the house was open when he got there and he let it swing shut with a clang so loud that even he winced. Realising he didn't have a key, he knocked loudly on the glass and dug his hands into his pockets as he waited for it to open. There was a distant scent of burning sausages and his stomach shifted again. Footsteps hurried down the hall and the door flew open.

"Merlin."

Hugo stopped pulling the tea towel through his hands and looked his cousin up and down. Gangly, taller than his father, the nineteen-year-old towered over James and shook his mop of flaming red hair in disbelief.

"Hugh! Come on, mate. Let me in."

"No way, man," the younger man responded, hand firmly on the door and his six-foot-plus frame blocked the gap. James smirked and chuckled. " off before anyone else sees you. They want your head on a plate."

"Hugo, hurry up!" Hermione's voice called from the kitchen, followed shortly by a crack and an exasperated sigh. The kitchen door cracked open. "Who is it?"

The boy turned from the man on the doorstep to his mother, then back to the guest. Feeling his lip curling, he lowered his eyelashes and looked to the kitchen again.

"Nobody. I'm dealing with it."

"Okay, well dinner'll be on the table in five minutes so deal with it quickly." The kitchen door shut and Hugo turned. Tracing heavy brown eyes over his cousin, he shook his head once more.

"Why in Merlin's name are you here? Haven't you caused enough misery?"

"When did our little Hufflepuff get so brave, hm?" James said, crossing his arms and leaning on the side of the porch with a teasing grin. He reached out and took Hugo's chin between two fingers, pinching purposefully and moving his head from side to side in vague amusement. "I live here, alright? Let me in."

"You _live_ here?" Hugo struggled to restrain the disbelief and yanked his face free, turning his head to the kitchen. James sighed tiredly.

"Yes and I'm starving so let me in." He stepped forward but Hugo blocked him again, arms crossed over his chest and his brow furrowed like his mother in deep concentration. "I'm getting bored of this now, mate."

"Hugo, get a move on." His father's voice was followed by heavy footsteps and with relative ease, he peered over his son's shoulder. His sigh fell into Hugo's ear and he put a soft hand on his arm. "Let him in." Hugo said nothing, did nothing. "Hugo." The teenager looked back and shook his head, stepping away so James could cross the threshold and shut the door behind him. Ron's hand on his arm tightened but he wrenched it away, turning back towards the kitchen.

Through the open door, they heard a murmur of, "Sorry, Mum, I've lost my appetite," before the surprisingly light footsteps of the young Weasley started again. He didn't look at his dad, nor at James, merely yanking open the door and leaving without another word. Ron stared at his godson blankly, the sunlight pulling out the crudest features across the man's stubbled jaw line. A scar, possibly new but he couldn't tell, cut from the bottom of the twenty-two year old's ear to midway down his cheek. He looked … old, far older than he acted or would probably ever act.

"Ron?" His wife's voice made him start and before he could react, the kitchen door had opened. "Dinner." The last syllable was stilted, sharp, at the sight of her nephew. She had almost forgotten, almost, but now it was all clicking into place. Not being able to quite make eye contact with either, she turned away. "Both of you."

-::-

"He's _back_?" Hugo said once he'd let himself into the Potters' house and found Lily in her room, sorting through a stack of paperwork. She looked up blankly at him and nodded. "Then why the fuck is he living in my house?" She looked back to her page, slipping her glasses off her nose and turning in her seat. She rested an arm on the back of the chair and leant her head into it, exhaustion reeling off her features with every movement.

"I don't know," she said slowly, measuredly. "Mum chucked him out when he turned up here."

Hugo gave an exasperated sigh and sat down on the floor, placing his hands on the plush carpet and scratching at it idly. Lily looked at him for a minute before turning back to her work. The silence between them was weighted and the scratching of her quill across the parchment was to both of them magnified beyond belief. Each line told a tale. Each finished letter, a story. Every movement of Lily's pale, freckled hand was too much to bear and Hugo snapped.

"Why's he back?"

"I don't _know_," she repeated, frustration stronger than sadness this time. "None of us have said two words to him. I've not even seen him."

She exhaled, this time pushing her paperwork away and twisting the cap back onto her inkpot. She rubbed her hands together and stood up. The window seat of her room looked over the front of the house, and over the tips of the trees that lined the front garden, the climb of the moors stretched ahead. She tucked herself onto the seat and her cousin tentatively followed. His tall, gangly figure barely fit, one leg hanging off the side, the other resting precariously on the seat. His hand on the window frame was all that kept him from slipping off and he looked to Lily, still small enough to curl into a small ball at the opposite end.

The only girl he could cope with crying, he sighed when he saw the tell-tale shake of her hands in her lap. He sat up straight, scooting into the centre of the bench, and let her crawl forwards and cry against his shoulder, as though it was the first day of school again and she was upset about leaving her parents behind.

This time, he was sure, she'd rather leave her parents behind a hundred times than face her brother again, and he wouldn't blame her in the slightest.

-::-

James fiddled with the lock of the stolen trunk again, tugging it up and down and occasionally opening the lid in the vain hope that something of value would have materialised. Besides the discovery of a couple of shillings in the bottom of the box which he had promptly discarded in a mix of confusion and disgust, he'd had no such luck. Pushing the lock back into place, he stood up and glanced around the room. It was small, chest-tightening. The white was starting to become clinical, distant, blinding, and he strode to the door, pulling it open for more air. The stairs creaked and he paused.

"James?" Hermione said once she came into view. "Could you come downstairs, please?" He clicked his tongue on the roof of his mouth and shrugged, secretly glad to get out of the confines of the room that was beginning to mark itself on the backs of his eyes. Each step he made on the stairs made his aunt wince, his feet still wrapped in battered old trainers, and she stopped before the living room door. "In you go."

He glanced down at her but she didn't say a word, just walked past him and into the kitchen. From the lounge, he could now hear the faint humming of a hushed conversation and he pushed the door open.

His mother's head swung up almost immediately and the urge in James' chest to turn and leave made him feel like his ribcage was about to burst. He choked out an incredulous laugh, one deep note doused in confusion, in worry, and in a fear that he would never admit to, then raised his eyebrows.

"Sit down."

James shut the door but continued standing, hands curled into fists at his side. Ginny glanced to her husband, who had one hand firmly over hers, but he shook his head. With her free hand, the woman tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and looked back to her son.

"Come home." She paused to see his reaction, but his face hadn't so much as twitched. It was like he was set in stone before her, and if only it were that easy. "It's not fair for you to trespass on your aunt and uncle like this."

"They could have said no," he said, shrugging as though there was no problem in his mind. His own mother had as good as shut the door in his face, and his aunt could have done the same.

"You knew they wouldn't or you wouldn't have come." She stopped again at a squeeze of her husband's hand over hers. They were meant to be sounding convincing – forgiving – enough to entice him back. One step over the line that had formed so solidly between parents and son and they'd be back to square one. "We need to sort this out, James."

"Sort what?"

"Don't play the fool," Harry warned, the first time he'd spoken and his voice laced in an uncharacteristic level of restraint. James coolly glanced to him before returning his gaze to his mother, willing her to go on with a lift of his eyebrows.

"You stole from your sister," she said, her voice heavy. "Everything she'd worked for. Every last Knut of it."

"Some people would say I was being entrepreneurial."

"Entrepreneurs don't use money to sleep with dozens of nameless women and travel halfway around the world -"

"I think I managed a full circle, actually."

"Shut up. Now." Gone from her voice was the tone of bitten back rationality and distant belief it would work, replaced by frustration, confusion, the urge to pin him down and force him to see what he'd done to her, to everyone. "You left your brother for dead and you know what, in spite of that, he didn't even protest when we suggested we bring you home." When James went to protest his innocence, Ginny stood up, dusting off her cloak and ripping her hand from her husband's. Her voice was calm against the tell-tale flush of her cheeks. She was shaking but she wouldn't let her son see. She had hidden tears from him when he was a child to save him hurt. This time it was merely to show she was stronger. "That's what real bravery is."

She kept her gaze on her son who hadn't so much as flinched. He towered over her by almost a foot and dug his hands into his pockets.

"So you're here because Al asked you to come?"

"We're here -" Harry began, standing too and straightening his back. Smaller by a few inches than James, and decidedly thinner too, he managed to set his face in a gaze of neutrality paralleling his eldest child's. James sank down onto the arm of the sofa and glanced up. "It was a shock, the other day. Now we've got used to it. We're giving you a second chance."

He didn't need to say anything else. The 'take it' was implied in every word he spoke. James moved his gaze slowly between his mother and father, eyes dark and giving nothing away. Pressing his palms against his thighs, he forced himself up.

"Fine."

The urge to press for a thank you was burning on the tongues of both his parents, but they were both well aware that it had been an intentional slip. Not letting James rile them had been something they'd talked over and over about before leaving. He wasn't going to break them this time. They knew what they were dealing with now. Their delusion was long gone.

"We'll be at home when you're ready," Ginny said, through a tight grimace before taking her husband's hand again and leaving the room. They stopped in the hallway, the door shut tightly behind them, and Hermione appeared tentatively from the kitchen. Ginny smiled at her, out of courtesy more than any form of happiness, and shrugged. The same question was on everyone's lips: _what happened?_

* * *

**A/N: I owe you all huge apologies for this delay. I have three reasons: one, from September until very recently, I was living in France with little to no internet meaning updating was difficult; two, I had writer's block on this until January; three, I may have forgotten about my account here. I'm really sorry. I'm going to update every day until it's finished - there are 19 chapters in total.**

**If I ever do forget to update, leaving me a private message or review to ask what's going on _will_ get my attention so feel free to do so!**


	6. Chapter 6

_Attends_ _= Wait._  
_Chapter title from the song of the same name by Oasis._

* * *

**Chapter Six: Champagne Supernova**

His room wasn't his anymore.

Where Hermione and Ron had retained every inch of Rose's childhood at their house, it seemed that his parents had wanted to erase any trace that he'd ever existed. Walls painted magnolia, carpet neutral, furniture standard, no trace that a teenage boy – that anyone – had ever lived in it.

Kicking at thin air, he perched on the edge of the white linen of the bed and looked around for any sign of the room he'd known, painted blue for the Arrows, posters lining the walls and bits of old brooms scattered across the floor. Nothing. He stood up and pulled open the pine drawers, all empty or filled with spare sheets, and swore under his breath. Clenching his fists, he walked to the window. The garden had been tidied up and once again, there was no trace of the pitch that he and Albus had torn up as kids, and the pond that Lily had frozen when she was six because she wanted to go ice-skating had been filled in; it was all so _adult_.

"Don't be like that!"

The voice came from the room below his, the kitchen, and there was a frustrated scream and the slam of a door. Footsteps stomping up the stairs preceded the door opening and his mother's continued pleading.

"Lily, stop."

James turned and darted away from the view from the door. Rolling onto the bed, he leant forwards and began picking at the fraying on his jeans. He heard his sister's footsteps draw to a stop, both of them now talking in harsh whispers that made him want to shut the door on them more than get up and exacerbate things. After another minute, there was an exasperated groan and the slam of a bedroom door.

"What are you doing in here?" Ginny poked her head around the open door of James's old room and he froze. "Get your shoes off the bed," she added, raising her eyebrows and he silently obeyed. She softened, leaning tentatively against the chest of drawers. "Lily didn't take it very well."

"You didn't tell her before?"

"Don't be stupid," she said. "She'd have been in Bolivia before the night was out." He let out one short laugh. "You're–" she paused, "well –"

Behaving. The word seemed to drift in the air around them, an imaginary halo lighting dimly above his head. He shrugged. The sight of his room had given him a jolt, that was all, and once he'd adjusted, he wasn't going to make this easy for them. He wasn't going to pretend he was giving in. His mother sighed and stood up. Without another word uttered, she left and James didn't budge from his seat until her footsteps had melted into the sound of pots and pans clanging in the kitchen; the washing up that Lily had abandoned.

"So do I get it back?"

The nineteen-year-old's voice was short, sharp, fuelled with cynicism and blankness. Anger gone, upset quenched, happiness? Non-existent.

James smirked. Game on. He leant forward, throwing a nonchalant arm out and cocking his head to the side, eyebrows raised in challenge.

"Get what back?"

"My money."

Now there was a waver in her tone, a weakness, a sign that her Gryffindor blood was throbbing through her but overrun by the Hufflepuff in her mind, the one she'd shoved away for the Sorting. She'd forced the blood to pump harder and harder until the Hat decided to place her in the house of her brothers. She would not let that be called futile now and she held her ground.

"You owe me five hundred Galleons." She paused, hands on her tiny hips, hair clipped out of her face and cheeks flushed Weasley red. James stood up and bent down to his bag, pulling open a draw and moving clothes into it as he spoke.

"I hadn't realised theft came with an interest rate. I thought I took four hundred and seventy three."

She didn't splutter. She didn't complain. She just stared at him until he stopped unpacking and turned to face her. She'd grown. He didn't know why he was so shocked but in front of him, she kept her gaze steady. She didn't shout for their father or kick up a fuss. She didn't cry – she rarely did – and didn't scream. She let her arms fall from her hips and looked away.

"Why are you back?"

"Why do you think?" he retorted before her question had even been finished. She sent him a fleeting glance but tore it away as soon as he caught her. Tugging on the fabric of her dress, she didn't press him. She knew the answer. He'd run out of money, out of luck. He'd lost a fortune and in doing so, had lost so much more too.

"You're disgusting." He shrugged. "Is that it?" He smirked. She turned around, her foot on the threshold of the door before turning. She was short – if she was nearer to him, she wouldn't reach his chest – but in the doorframe, she looked powerful, dynamic. "I don't know why they let you come back here." Her words weren't eloquent and they weren't cruel but they bit at him, little by little. "I don't know why they even still call you their son." She paused and looked him up and down, a word on the tip of her tongue that she couldn't force off and before he could reply, she turned her back and left.

Clicking her door shut behind her, she locked it with her wand – twice – and sank onto the armchair set up in the corner of a room. It sighed with her as she curled up, tugging a cushion from behind her and holding it close. Her excess words were still whirring around her brain; what she wished she could have said to the brother that, in her eyes, was only so in blood.

-::-

"For the last _fucking_ time, it wasn't me!"

Louis winced at Dominique's tone but their mother stood firm, hands on slim hips and her face set in the finest marble. The redheaded woman scowled like a teenager and her brother glanced warily from her to their mother.

"Language," Fleur said, "and 'e is not invited to ze wedding?"

"No." Dominique's voice was fuelled with the labour of keeping controlled under her mother's attack. "And in case you've forgotten, that wedding is tomorrow and I really need to go home."

"_Attends_," her mother called as she turned her back and made to walk to the fireplace. "If 'e comes, what do we do?"

The redhead looked at her mother tiredly. She could almost feel the bags under her eyes weighing her down and her whole body had lost the zeal that had fuelled it thus far. Calmly, with more poise and politeness than even Fleur would have liked, she shrugged and without another word, she walked to the fire and disappeared in a spit of green flames, leaving Louis alone to deal with the worried mutterings of their mother.

She landed with grace in the fireplace of her home, her bridesmaids all lounged out over her sofa before her, waiting on her arrival. She said not a word to them, breezing past and shutting the kitchen door of the little cottage. She leant against the worktop, twisting her hands together nervously and almost jumped out of her skin when there was a gentle knock on the door. She said nothing and the door creaked open, bringing her chief bridesmaid, Molly, into view.

The older redhead shut the door behind her and eased herself into the chair that sat in a corner. Dominique shook her head and looked away, her cousin respecting her request for silence for only a second.

"You want him to come, don't you?" she said, one hand protectively held over the bulge of her stomach. Married herself merely a few months before, Molly had beaten Victoire to the role of Dominique's right-hand woman in spite of her pregnancy, and knew full well that while Dominique had not invited James to the wedding, that she would not turn him away if he were to turn up.

"He was my best friend," the bride-to-be replied, shaking her head and looking to Molly. "I didn't invite him but if he turns up, then I'm not going throw him out." She paused, taking in Molly's distant look of almost pity, sympathy. "Don't look at me like that. I thought you were on my side in this."

"I am," Molly said. She, like Dominique and Rose and Fred, had not taken quite so harshly to their cousin's actions. Though nobody could justify them or make them right, they were certainly not as ready to pretend he didn't exist as everyone else appeared to be. She sighed, her hand absentmindedly drifting over her stomach. "Come on, come inside. Everyone's worried."

She stood up and held her hand out. Dominique didn't take it but smiled gratefully and followed her cousin into the living room. Tomorrow was her wedding day. James didn't seem to know anything about it and perhaps that was how it ought to stay. It was not the place for a family bust-up. She would not let it be.

-::-

James woke late the next day, listening to the whispering through the house creep under the door. He hadn't said a word to either of his parents, and certainly not his sister, all night, shutting himself away in his room and fiddling with every inch of it, trying to discover the slightest thing that would register as familiar. After finding that everything really had been ripped from the character he had given it as a teenager, he had opened the bottle of alcohol – he wasn't sure what it was – that he'd bought from the Muggle off-licence before knocking on his parents' door with his tail between his legs, blushing a furious red out of shame at how he'd given in rather than at what he had done. It had landed to his parents to misinterpret it, and he hadn't planned on correcting them.

On first sip, it hadn't seemed quite as strong as much of the magical drink he'd subjected his body to, but after quarter of the bottle had disappeared, he had begun to feel queasy, and once it was half empty, he'd had to give in and put it away. His slumber came quickly and easily, and he woke fully dressed and feeling as though somebody had knocked him over the head with an exceptionally large and heavy club. He stood and his stomach shifted uncomfortably. Now his throat was beginning to throb every time he swallowed and he was _sure_ that the ground had never been so uneven before. He lurched to the door and stopped.

His parents must have been talking in the hall because their voices were louder now. His head was weighing him down and so he crouched carefully, making sure his body didn't cast a shadow through the crack above the threshold.

"- serious?" his mother was saying and he heard his father sigh that same sigh that flaunted his dissatisfaction without causing an argument. James could almost hear his mother raising her eyebrows and pressed his ear closer to the wall.

"We can't babysit him if he's not with us," was the argument in return. "Merlin knows what's going to happen if we leave him here."

"He won't make the same mistake twice." His father scoffed and the whole scene was playing out so vividly in James's head. He knew his mother had shaken her head and began to walk away, the floorboards creaking under her weight before she turned and carried on. "He'll cause more trouble there. Not a soul will be looking at Dominique, it'll all be about him. It's her big day. Let her have it."

"So, what? We're going to take our life savings with us in case he does it again?"

"Even James isn't stupid enough to do that again," Ginny said and on the other side of the door, her son froze. "It'll be fine, love. We'll only be gone for a few hours."

"Yeah, and he only needs a few seconds to upset the entire thing."

The conversation fizzled out and James could only assume that they had migrated to their bedroom to continue the conversation. He stood up, his head still feeling like a boulder on his shoulders, and leant against the frame to keep his balance. They had no faith in him, that he had been aware of when he made his return, but his mother's naivety was really something else. He glanced to his watch. Already half-past eleven, he had less than three hours to change their minds.

-::-

Albus stood in the doorway of his sister's room, watching as Lily pulled at the curls that fell around her face, biting her lip and trying to work out whether they looked quite right. Switching her position in front of the mirror, flicking her wand to change the angle that the light fell over her, she started when she saw her brother watching her and scowled.

"It looks fine," he said when she glanced hesitantly back to the mirror, tugging again at the way it fell against her cheek. "Mum wants to know if you're ready." She nodded and turned to her dressing table, picking up her bag. "Seen him?"

"Not today. Still asleep, I think."

"Right." He dug his hands into the pockets of his dress robes and looked around the room, unsure as to where to land his gaze.

"Dad wanted to bring him with us, you know?" Lily said as she closed the clasp of her bag and ushered her brother out. Shutting the door behind her and locking it twice with her wand, she led the way downstairs. Albus rolled his eyes.

"Well, we know that for a hero of the world, he's a bit of a dunce."

"Don't talk about your father like that."

The eyes and ears of Ginny Potter were trained everywhere and from the downstairs loo, where she was touching up her make-up, their mother sent them a warning look. Albus muttered a low apology and she smiled.

"Come on, chin up," she said, reaching up to rearrange Lily's hair and tutting at the mess that Al had made of his tie. They both smiled, though neither reached their eyes, and their mother stopped fussing with a content nod. "You two can get off, if you like. We'll follow you."

They didn't argue and kissing her a swift goodbye, they left the house. Once out of the garden gate, they both let out a breath.

"You don't think he's going to do anything whilst we're out, do you?" Lily asked, glancing up at the side of the house as they made their way away from the protective enchantments which kept them safe from prying eyes. Al shrugged.

"I don't know. With him, I don't think anyone does."

-::-

Her heart had never felt quite like this before, like it was getting bigger and bigger and filling every last inch of her body. Her fiancé's – husband's – hand in hers made her breath choke and even though she'd promised herself that she wouldn't cry, looking at every lace handkerchief raised to every damp eye made her eyes sting. Her mother looking up at her, every inch the epitome of composure in normal circumstances, was smiling broadly and using manicured fingers to wipe the tears away from her eyes. Her cousins, her friends all kept their heads down but Lucy's shoulders were shaking from trying not to let herself cry and Fred was looking decidedly tense beside his girlfriend, who was grinning and playing with the camera in her hands threateningly.

Dominique glanced behind her, where Molly was clinging to her daughter's hand and Victoire was trying to restrain her son from making a run to his father. Both smiled broadly at her, and she grinned back, shaking her hair out of her eyes.

With the marquee behind them, she leant into her husband who kissed her forehead and helped her into the house. Laughing between them as the noise from the garden began to erupt, Matthew stopped first. Still unaware of anything wrong, Dominique's laugh died into a whimper.

Every single wedding present, stored so tidily when she had last been in the room, had been knocked over or ripped apart. She shook her head and let go of her husband's hand. Her dress dragged noisily across the floor and when she stopped, everything about her that had glowed just seconds before was ripped away.

"Aight, Domi?"

She stepped forwards and her foot cracked over something. Shards of green glass from the smashed bottles of empty champagne – flown in from France, courtesy of Tante Gabrielle – and dribbled down the front of his stained white shirt and undone tie were the contents of them. He stumbled to his feet, lurching towards her.

"Nice to get an invite."

"What's taking so long?" Bill's voice made Matthew start and he leapt towards the door. Dominique and James didn't move and not even the sounds of her father's heavy footsteps made a mark on their staring contest. "Merlin. Get Ginny."

The words were like gobbledygook in their ears and Dominique felt her mouth opening and closing in shock.

"What? Oh don't worry, there was nothing decent. Cheapskates, the lot of them."

"The drink, the food," was all she could reply and when the noise of the crowd grew nearer, she jumped at a hand on her arm. She let it guide her away, though whose it was made little difference. She passed Ginny, George, her grandmother and Charlie, all pushing to get to the front. The smell of her brother's aftershave cut against her and she realised it was Louis who was holding onto her. She stopped at the head of the crowd and turned.

Charlie and George had yanked him to his feet, their looks of contempt equally matched. Their mother was looking on sadly and Ginny's face was set in stone. She stepped forwards, took everything in and then turned her back.

"Get him out."

She walked with her head hung and when she passed Dominique, she whispered the smallest of apologies. The young woman shook her head and watched her cousin – the man she had once called her best friend – be dragged from the house through the throng of family members and guests who had arrived for the reception.

Not a soul cried.

He wasn't worth the tears.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven: Aftermath**

In a perfect world, he would never have had to come back in the first place. He would never have had to face his parents again or hear what they thought of him, and then maybe he wouldn't have got so drunk and done what he did at the wedding. He certainly wouldn't have this throbbing head, either, and the very thought of moving made him want to retch.

"Awake, are you?" The voice sounded distant and the blurs in the room began to form into shapes and then into people. Or one person duplicated, he couldn't quite tell with the pounding of his brain against his skull. Whatever he was lying on sunk and a hand pressed itself against his forehead none too gently. "Sit up." It was definitely a woman and he had a horrible sinking feeling in his stomach that only made him want to be sick more. He couldn't remember anything from last night. Had he found himself into another randomer's bed? Surely if he was ithat/i drunk, she wouldn't have wanted to do anything…

He suddenly felt very aware that he was then most probably stark naked in the middle of a stranger's home and licked his lips, dry and still stained with champagne.

"Where are my trousers?"

"You're wearing them, you berk," she said, turning around and picking something up off the floor.

"Are they my boxers?" he said and the woman stood up.

"It's my scarf. Now will you sit up?"

It sounded so familiar and yet distorted in his mind to a drone, like a buzz of a bee hovering in his ear. The woman was strong, whoever she was, and helped him hoist his body upright. She flicked her wand and the lights came on dimly. To his left was a chair with a bucket balanced on the seat, and when he moved his head to the right, his whole body lurching with it, he saw a tray of potions in an array of colours that he wasn't sure if he wasn't imagining.

"Drink." A hand, lightly freckled he could see now, in the light, held out one of the glasses and he looked at it in disgust. "Drink," she said again and as he put it to his mouth tentatively, she tipped it back for him. It slithered down his throat, gloopy, almost solidifying on his tongue, and he could feel it winding its way to his stomach. He thought he might be sick until for the first time in what felt like days, the nausea passed on. His head still throbbed and his eyes were still not all the way open, but the woman put another glass in his hand and this time, he took it without force.

Although his head didn't clear up completely, it felt less like it was made of lead and with his sickness gone, he felt safer rubbing his eyes to clear the sleep from his eyelashes. The lights brightened a little more again and the woman got up from the bed, clattering around with the array of solutions she'd brought up.

"Rose?"

"Yes," she said, frowning and looking at him as though he was insane. "Who'd you think it was?" He closed his eyes, wondering whether he could exchange her for some leggy brunette instead, and shook his head.

"Not anyone who knows Dominique," he said and he thought for a moment that Rose had laughed, but from the stony look on her face when she turned back around, he doubted it very much. He made to get up but she raised her eyebrows and shook her head. "What?"

"You're not going anywhere. I want you where I can keep an eye on you."

"You sound like my mother."

"No, I don't," she said coolly. "If I sounded like your mother, you'd be on the street."

He laughed but she didn't show any sign of being amused. Setting the tray on the dresser and dimming the lights again, she left the room. When the door was closed, she lingered for a moment for any signs of movement but there was nothing. She exhaled softly and made her way to the living room of the tiny flat she lived in. James's spoiled clothes from the night before were hanging up drying. Stained with alcohol and the vomit from trying to move his inebriated body from where her uncles had left him, at the pub in the village, to her place, she had taken no pleasure in having to strip him to his underwear and then redress him in the clothes that Owen hadn't wanted when he moved out.

She sat herself down in the armchair in the corner of the room, picking up the newspaper that had come whilst she was upstairs and skimming it for anything worth noting. Naturally, there was nothing beyond reforming a couple of tiny, irrelevant laws and an advert for the Gobstones World Championship in Skegness. She dropped the paper back on the floor and sighed.

Dominique might have been who he had once called his best friend, but James and Rose had grown up with that name attached to them. Closer in age to each other than to Albus, they had taunted and teased their way through childhood until James left for Hogwarts and things began to shift. He had come back with a swagger, straight backed pride and a smirk painted permanently on his face. Rose was no longer good enough. He had become close to Dominique, the pride and joy of second-year Gryffindor, and so she lay forgotten in the depths of memory. She took to Albus instead, the shy and retiring type that she did not loathe but rather did not fully understand.

She was glad of being sorted into Ravenclaw, if only for the space from the boys who she was obligated to like yet had no desire to spend more time with.

Perhaps that was where it had all gone wrong for James; maybe if she'd stuck with him, she could have grounded him back where he belonged. Her mother had always said she had a way with people, a way that neither of her parents had. Albus had come out of his shell. Lily had stayed on the straight and narrow, and although Hugo veered off course easily, he always came back. James was a lost cause. Everyone had said it but she wasn't sure anyone had truly believed it until now.

She begged to differ.

He had wanted to get up and leave, to not look behind and there was only one reason he would have done so. He was embarrassed, ashamed and he was scared of what might face him if the rest of their family caught him anywhere near Weasley blood. He wasn't quite as bad as they said, and where there was hope, there was the chance of fixing it.

She just had to find a way of doing it without ostracising herself from the family too.

-::-

Molly swept her wand up with a final emphatic flick before collapsing into one of the chairs still out from the night before. Her whitening hair was teasing its way out of the bun at the back of her head and her exhaustion fed right into her very core. It was seven o'clock and every last remnant of the night before had now been tidied away from sight. She closed her eyes.

Her only daughter's eldest son had always been a troublemaker. He would tug at Lucy's plaits until she cried and push Dominique into the flowerbeds. They let it slide with a tut and a pointing finger; his spite came from a lack of the attention lavished on him by everyone when he was alone.

She had struggled to believe it when he disappeared. He had threatened it for a while, that somewhere something bigger was calling, but she thought they were words of a teenager too arrogant for his own good and that it would die away with time. Lily's savings from the work she did every holiday taken from her account, Albus – the meek and mild – knocked out and left slumped at the foot of the garden, not so much as a note giving the family an apology or his love.

And Molly knew he loved them because in spite of everything her grandson was, he had always been the first to leap for a hug or plant a kiss on the cheek of a relative he would later confide he didn't even like. The boy had once appreciated his family regardless of their faults. People didn't change that much, not without reason.

"I told you I'd do this, Molly."

Percy's wife was stood in the middle of the kitchen, her dressing gown wrapped tightly around her and her eyes heavy with sleeplessness. The older woman shook her head.

"It took my mind off things." Audrey sat down on the seat beside her mother-in-law and smiled.

"Where do you think he is?" 

_"Rose? Rose?"_

_Molly's short stature darted with a youth she thought she had long left behind in an attempt to reach her granddaughter, stood off to the side clutching a champagne glass she hadn't taken a sip from. The tall girl glanced down to her grandmother and stooped a little to hear the whisper._

_"Go and get him." Rose bit her lip and Molly squeezed her hand. "For me, Rosie. Keep him safe."_

_The reluctance oozed from every pore of the girl's body but nonetheless, she nodded. Molly didn't hang around and made her way towards where Lucy and Roxanne were looking bored and dejected in silence. She glanced around to the spot she'd left but Rose had gone._

_There was only one person who could fix James. She just hoped it would work._

"I don't know," Molly said, her voice low. Audrey nodded but there was something in the way her eyes moved that suggested she didn't believe her.

"I hope he's okay."

Molly covered her daughter-in-law's hand with her own and patted it softly. She'd always had a good heart; Hufflepuffs were underestimated.

"Me too, dear. Me too."

-::-

Louis angrily tapped his wand against the shattered glass but it merely twinkled on the wrapping paper and then dulled again. He'd not slept. He'd taken every single broken present up to the attic room of his grandmother's house once the crowd had fizzled away and spent all night doing his best to rectify his cousin's damage. James always had been a selfish bastard. What he couldn't have was banned from everyone else too; toys, brooms, girls, it had always been the same. If he couldn't be there, he'd want to ruin it for everyone else too.

In his absence, people had blotted out the worst of him. It would have been easier for everyone to invite him and watch him like a herd of deer waiting for the kill than to let him to his own devices. Louis knew he was just as guilty; he'd tried to have as little as possible to do with James as he could, though his mother's respect for Harry and Dominique's old friendship with the Potter boy often led to their close proximity.

He stared at the glass again, trying to work out what it might have been. It would make it easier to fix, at any rate. Around him were plates, shining new again, photo frames bent back into shape, towels with the quiche and champagne stains removed, but this glimmering mess was a mystery.

He'd promised his sister he would fix it. He'd promised them both that it would be okay. Even though he was younger than them, still his protectiveness swept through him as though he were their elder. He was the man. They used to mock him for saying that but now he was the one making everything better. Victoire had gone home, exhausted and carrying two children under five wearily. Dominique was downstairs, somewhere, and only four hours ago he had still heard her crying.

He looked at the label of the present, standing up with a bit of a stagger from the tiredness that he was just coming to feel.

_Dear Dom and Matt,_

_All the best for married life._

_Love,_

_Rose_

He siphoned every piece of broken glass into one of the boxes of the photo frames and wrapped a ribbon messily around it. As he approached the kitchen, he could hear the murmurs of newly awoken adults and he turned on his heel. He didn't want questions. Instead, he opened the front door and hurried away down the path, praying everyone was too preoccupied with each other to gaze outside. Once free of the enchantments of his grandparents' home, he Disapparated, box clutched tightly to him, leaving only the slightest footprint in his wake.


	8. Chapter 8

******Chapter Eight: Shattered**

The knock on her door was frantic and Rose started. She'd fallen asleep in her armchair and with a quick glance around, she pulled herself back into reality and leapt to her feet. Grabbing her wand, she swept James's clothes behind the chair just in case, and flicked the lock of the door open. Whoever was on the other side took the click of the door as an invitation and opened it gently.

"Rose?"

Louis' soft tone floated through before his body and as he peered around the door, Rose tried her best to smile as though everything was normal, as though she wasn't harbouring the family's current number one enemy in her bedroom. There was something of James's aftershave in the air, and she was hoping that the voices wouldn't attract his attention and call him out of bed.

"Yeah?" she asked softly. He came inside properly and shut the door. Her eyes fell on the box in his hand and she frowned. Without another word, he walked past and sat down on the settee. "You look a mess," she said, putting a hand gently on his shoulder. "Have you slept?" He shook his head and now she could see his eyes drooping. His skin was coloured a paler white than normal and for the first time, everything about him seemed lifeless. She sighed and squeezed his arm. "I'll get you a drink."

"No, I'm fine," he said, turning to face her and she stopped. He held up the box, his arms shaking a bit from the exhaustion and she took it obediently. It was hurriedly wrapped and undoing it was tricky but nonetheless, the ribbon fell away and she uncapped the box.

"Oh."

Her fingers traced loosely across the shattered outline of what had been a carefully chosen and even more carefully crafted wedding present.

"I've fixed every single one but I can't work this one out," he said and the irritation was rife in his voice. Rose's spell work was second only to Louis' and she knew that he would not have come to her except in a moment of desperation. She cradled the box as delicately as he had.

"Are you sure you've got all the pieces?"

It looked smaller now it was smashed to bits yet there was still the refinement and elegance to it that had attracted her eye in the first place. He nodded then shook his head and groaned.

"I don't know. I think so." He rubbed his eyes and Rose set the box down on the floor. "I can't fucking believe him." She cast a furtive glance back to the bedroom and murmured a low agreement. Louis' fists were clenched, beating gently against the arm of his seat and Rose sighed.

"Go home," she said and he looked to her like she was mad. "Or go to Nanna's, wherever you've been, and sleep." He went to protest, flailing one hand towards the box. "I'll fix it." There was a hesitation in his movement that she read as a lack of faith in her ability. "Let me try." He still seemed a little sceptical but he pushed his hair back from his forehead and stood up wearily. Even from where Rose was stood, she could see that every bone in his body ached. "Are you okay to Apparate like that?"

The last thing anyone needed at the minute was a splinching to deal with. He nodded and murmured something that sounded like it could have been 'I'll be fine.' He walked towards the door which Rose was holding open and they gave each other a firm hug.

"I'll get it back to you as soon as I can," she promised. He smiled his thanks and disappeared through the door. Rose shut it softly, wandering to the window and watching Louis appear, look around for signs of life before Disapparating, not so much as half an eyebrow left behind. She relaxed. Picking up the box on the floor, she turned to the settee and sat down, placing it on her lap and poking at the shards with her wand.

It was ruined. She was sure she could make it whole again but the magic of it would be lost. There had been something so perfect about it, sitting on the shelf of that shop in Caernarfon, alone and unique. The care and thought that had gone into it was irreplaceable.

She looked behind her. There was no sound from her bedroom. He slept on in silent oblivion whilst everything he'd left behind became ash.

-::-

Dominique held tighter and tighter to Matt's hand with every step they descended. The sound of voices had grown steadily louder with the sound of their rumbling stomachs and now facing the family was unavoidable. There was always the option of making a break for it, leaving and forgetting it all, going on the honeymoon a few days early but he would never let her and underneath it, she was grateful.

She had thought that most people had gone home the night before but as they stepped into the kitchen, there seemed to be as many faces if not more that turned to watch; Victoire had come back, Little Molly hadn't left, the aunts and uncles were conspiring in a corner. Out of the mix came her grandmother, still quick on her feet and quick to action as she could remember. "I'll put some toast on," she said, squeezing Dominique's hand. The redhead smiled and stepped forwards. The conversation had started to die away a little now and Fleur stepped forward.

"Look," she said, and in the corner of the room she hadn't looked at, void of people, was a table filled with neatly wrapped gifts, piled as high as those she had passed yesterday. Dominique glanced confusedly to her mother who merely smiled.

"Louis." Audrey's voice carried over the rest as she stepped forward. "He stayed up all night." Dominique's eyes scanned the room but there was no sign of her brother.

"He sleeps," Fleur said and the swell of Dominique's heart grew again. Next time he talked about looking after her, she vowed not to laugh. She took the plate that her grandmother thrust into her hand and let her mother guide her into a seat near the table. The family began to disperse now they'd seen her, leaving only Victoire and Molly behind. In the garden, the marquee still stood and they watched as the rest made their way inside, congregating to continue the conversation.

"How are you?" Victoire asked, sitting down on one of the other chairs. Molly followed, keeping a cautious eye on the room for prying ears. Dominique shook her head.

"I don't know." She'd forgotten for a second that Matt was there and he squeezed her hand softly. "I'm just not thinking about it." It was a lie. Every other thought that crossed her mind was surrounded in a picture of James amongst the destruction but even if the other two didn't believe her, they still nodded along as though her word was true. "How is everyone?"

"Oh, you know," Victoire said, "ranting and raving. What you'd expect, really." She brushed her hair out of her eyes and smiled. She glanced over to the presents. "Louis is exhausted. He could barely form a sentence when he brought them down."

"Poor thing," Dominique said softly. Her little brother had always meant the world to her, even amongst their silly arguments about Quidditch teams and her dislike of his girlfriends. When she was in school, she'd once said she'd rather James her brother than Louis. The pair of them had marched off with a melodious cackle and linked arms. She hadn't looked back. She wondered if he still remembered. She'd almost forgotten herself. It was funny what moments like these could do.

"Eat," Molly said, and Dominique recalled with a jolt the plate on her lap. She picked up a slice of toast, nibbling on it gently. "Immy said you looked like a princess." A flash of yesterday came back to the bride, of a tiny dark haired girl with eyes bluer than hers grinning up at her in awe; Molly's daughter, her goddaughter. "I think she wants to be you when she grows up."

"God help the world," Victoire murmured and for the first time, Dominique's smile cracked through. Matt's arm slipped around her and she leant against him. Taking the cue to leave, her sister and cousin excused themselves and disappeared into the garden. He kissed the crown of her head and she drew back a bit to look at him properly.

"It's going to be okay, isn't it?"

It wasn't a question looking for reassurance. It was almost a statement, a recognition that a ruined reception wasn't the end of their world. He tilted her head up and placed a gentle kiss on her lips before taking her back in for a hug.

"Of course."

-::-

James stretched out, his legs tangled in the sheets and for a moment, he forgot where he was. The bed underneath him was hard and the pillows too soft and he sat up. His head was throbbing just a little bit and he glanced down to the couple of glasses that he realised with a crash back to earth had contained the remedies Rose had made him. There was unease, deep in his gut, that he'd not felt for a long time. It wasn't the feeling of a hangover. It was heavier, drilling deeper into him, past physicality and into the depths of his mind.

He stood up, dressed in clothes that were too long and too big for him, and glanced in the mirror. Almost instantly, he recoiled. He was the colour of the head of a fine pint of ale and the way his hair stuck to his forehead gave the illusion that he'd dunked his body into one too. How did anyone find that attractive?

Over the top of the unrest in his stomach was a growl of hunger and he looked to the door. There was nothing but silence and he thought that maybe if Rose had gone out, he could help himself to a couple of slices of bread and something to put some colour back in his cheeks. He opened the door, hinges squeaking, and peered out. The place was tiny. From where he stood, just inside the threshold of the bedroom, he could see every other room, covered in clutter. Strange, he thought, given that Rose had always been one for the big and simple; men included.

"Rose?" he called and jumped when his cousin's head poked up from the sofa where she'd been lying or sleeping or reading. She rubbed her eyes and pulled herself up. "Can I grab something to eat?" He almost cringed at how needy he sounded but she nodded and stood up, yanking her sleeves down to cover her hands and passing him as she went into the kitchen.

"I've not got much," she said, opening a cupboard and showing him the contents. "Toast?"

He nodded silently. There was something awkward about it now, being in this place that was so un-Rose that he thought he was missing something. He'd not given much thought to his immediate family, and none whatsoever to the extended Weasley clan. He'd changed – that much was obvious – but he'd never imagined the others would too. From her obsessively neat, pristine past, Rose had stepped forward into a similar world of vaguely organised chaos as he and Dominique had always loved.

He started when his cousin held out a plate for him and took it with a small smile and whispered thank you. Was it guilt? Was that what he was feeling? Dominique's name made his stomach shift more violently.

"Am I going to be that family member nobody ever talks about?" he asked as Rose moved a pile of paper so he could sit down on the armchair. His clothes from the night before were draped across the back of the sofa and he yanked his trousers up a bit again. She lay down on the settee, curled into a small ball and looking at him as though she didn't know what to say.

"You already were," she said, a twinge of sadness to her voice that he thought he might have imagined. They fell into a momentary silence until Rose stopped picking at her nails and looked back up. "Why the fuck did you do it?"

Rose had sworn. Rose never swore. He'd taken the piss out of her so much for it in their youth – in his mind, he was still a youth only now it felt like he was cheating, like he'd missed out on that turning point that everyone else was coming through – and yet here she was: Miss Goody-Two-Shoes, swearing.

"They didn't invite me," he said and for a moment, it sounded like it made perfect sense. Then it was as though he'd misheard himself and he frowned, trying to get his head around his own words as the redhead in front of him raised her eyebrows and shook her head. She propped herself up on her elbow and sighed. "And that's not a reason."

"You've got that right."

He sighed, running his hand back through his hair. It was slowly drying off now but he could smell the sweat on himself and gagged. It wasn't that he wasn't used to it. When he'd been off on his travels, he'd often go a week without finding a suitable place to bathe but now, back in civilisation, back in an enclosed space and with a clear head, he found it disgusting.

"Can I have a shower?"

Rose seemed to hesitate before answering, as though she wanted to press a question from earlier but she nodded, gesturing to the one door he'd not been through yet.

"Towels are in the cupboard," she said. He stood up and nodded, gathering his clothes from behind her and making his way into the room. Shutting the door, he sighed. This was not the way things were meant to go.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine: Epiphany**

When she was little, James used to sing to her when she was sick. He'd never had much of a voice but there had always been something about him that calmed her down. Her big brother, her protector; she'd never seen the dark to him. With her, he was always smiles and laughs and playful jabs in the ribs. He had threatened to beat up Finlay Fenwick when she found him snogging Tish Jordan in the common room, and he had stood there, every single holiday, by her side as she earned the money to send her halfway across the world. It was him who had always told her not to scrounge off their parents. He had said it wasn't fair.

Had he always had this motive, even when he was fifteen?

Rolling over, Lily stared up at the sky. There was usually something about England in summer that made everything seem okay but against the never-ending blue above her head, she could see the specks of grey cloud, the tails of airplanes, the daylight shadow of the moon. It wasn't perfect; things never were, after all.

"Do you want some lunch?"

Her mother's voice was steadier than it had been in days. There had been something about having James home that had made her tense, stressed like Lily remembered her being in their childhood. Upon her son's return, she had straightened up, become the leader that Lily had thought she had left behind when they had started to grow up. Now, it was back to the placid tone of the days of James's absence.

"Yeah, please," Lily said back, pulling a dandelion out of the grass and twirling it between two fingers. She waited for her mum to ask her to be more specific but the words never came.

She pushed a strand of dark red hair out of her face and let the flower drop onto her stomach. Nature; it had been the one thing she'd always felt somewhat akin to. James had joked it was her name. She'd punched him. There was just something about it that made her feel happier than in a room full of people. She wasn't shy, far from it, but people were loud and brash and thoughtless. They said things that hurt. Nature never did. The world, the silent living world that they lived off, was filled with secrets and she could only learn a small amount from the tiny village in the county in the tiny country. Out there, that was where she was meant to be.

The soft padding of her mother's footsteps on the ground made her roll her eyes to the left. The plate dropped down by her side, followed by her mum's body. She held out a bowl of crisps and a blanket, and Lily sat up so that Ginny could spread it out beneath them. They'd had a lot of this, the mother-daughter bonding or whatever it was that those people called it, since James had left. In her childhood, in the two years when her brothers had been at school and she had been alone in the home, they had built forts in the living room and played hide and seek in the cellar. She had come back from first-year thinking it stupid and childish but now, she wanted nothing more than to take the blanket under their bodies and drift it over the furniture again. She wanted to pretend she could hear bears and wolves and centaurs outside. She wanted to pretend that lettuce was boiled nettles, carrots the stripped down branches of an exotic tree.

"You okay?" Ginny asked, pulling at the crusts of her sandwich. Lily smiled and shrugged.

"I suppose." She took a bite of her own lunch. Raspberry jam – her favourite. Would James even remember something like that? He'd always preferred damson. "You?"

Ginny nodded slowly, taking a crisp and chewing carefully. Lily smiled. Her mother was forty-five but didn't look a day over thirty; svelte, her skin smooth and hair as red as ever. She had never looked frail or weak until it came to her eldest son's visit. Her appetite had failed under the cover of James's return. Lily supposed she thought she'd hidden it well but there are some things that nineteen years of knowing someone can't disguise. She'd noticed the food being pushed around the plate, the first to her feet to clear up, the last to bed. Worry didn't become anyone but on her mother, it was scary.

"Where do you think he is?"

Lily frowned. How was she supposed to know? She would be exaggerating if she said that he could fall off the face of the earth and she wouldn't feel a thing, but at the same time, she merely felt indifferent. She could see him, sprawled over some bar somewhere, passed out and lying there until the doors opened again. Maybe he'd end up in some poor soul's bed, their name just a distant memory. As long as he was nowhere near them, nowhere where he could hurt her family, she didn't care.

"I don't know," she said honestly. "Why?"

"I can't believe my mum would let him stay in a Muggle pub," she said, slowly as though the thoughts were coming to her as she spoke, new and fresh. "I can't. She's not like that." She paused, licking her lips. "We're not like that."

"You think he's at Nanna's?" Lily prompted and Ginny shrugged.

"I don't know for sure," she said. "But I'd guess so, yeah."

Lily took a long sip from the bottle that her mother had brought out with her. It made sense. There was something new now, past the anger and the false hatred that they had felt during James's first escapade. This time, there was distant guilt, pity. The golden boy had fallen from grace. He had turned from the boy everyone thought would become the Coolest Uncle, the Best Dad, the success story of their lives, into a young man filled with so much disdain for the family that made him who he was that he had to ruin it for his own satisfaction, for his own sanity. He had to stay in charge. That was why he had done it, Lily realised in that moment. He had felt he was losing control and the only way to bring himself back from the brink of dependence was to create something big, something explosive.

He was only twenty-two but he was ashamed. He had turned into someone he hated and _that_ was why he had left at nineteen and that was why when he'd come back, he'd come out to destroy everything around him.

It made sense. She knew that she knew him better than that, better than she had thought for so long. Expectations had finally become too much and he had cracked. She took another sip from the bottle and then finished off her sandwich.

She dusted her hands off and smiled. She understood. Finally, she understood.

-::-

Al kicked his heels against the side of his bed gently, his hands cradling a small golden ball, cold in his grasp. He threw it in the air, not following its path before catching it neatly. He had never been Quidditch material. It had been James's thing, before everything went balls up, and even he wasn't great. Maybe that's what it was, Al mused. Maybe he is how he is because of Quidditch.

He snorted almost as soon as the thought crossed his mind. It was ridiculous. Admittedly, so was everything concerning his oaf of a brother but James didn't care that much for the sport. Al was fairly sure he had only showed interest so that he had a conversation topic, so that he fitted the stereotype expected of him by the outside world and, in James's kind of messed up, definitely pea sized brain, to make sure their parents were proud of him continuing their legacy.

He stopped throwing his father's Snitch in the air and flopped back across the bed. His room was small, smaller than his siblings', anyway. After James had left the first time, he'd tried to convince his mum to let him move. She had said no. Even after she'd stripped it of every single piece of James that he'd left behind, she wouldn't let a soul in. Grieving for the living was a strange feeling.

Al glanced up to his window. If his room lacked in size, the view made up for it. It looked straight across to the moor in the distance, trees growing sparser and sparser until there was nothing but an expanse of what was now dark heather growing past the capabilities of his poor eyesight. He smiled, a soft but heartfelt smile that always set him apart from everyone else with their big grins and strong laughs. He tossed the Snitch from hand to hand absent-mindedly. The stories his father had told him and James were beyond the realms of imagination, founded so deeply in reality that it had become impossible for those who had not experienced it to imagine; a world so far apart from the calmness of today, generally speaking.

James wasn't evil. He didn't do what he did to upset people. He understood feelings and he must have known, deep down, that what he was doing was wrong. Albus didn't claim to know much, an average student at best, but he knew his brother. He knew his family. He knew they were acting as protectors for the majority but still they loved him. They only knew of one way to eradicate a problem, and that was to remove the source.

"Knut for them?" His father's voice startled him and Albus sat up, the Snitch almost falling out of his grasp, except for the tips of his fingers clasping around it. "We'll make a Seeker of you yet." The younger man smiled, sitting up straight and tightening his hand around his father's heirloom. Strictly speaking, it was meant to be kept in its box, hidden away from view. Harry had promised it to him when he was a child and now, it had its place behind a row of unread books on the case.

"I don't hate him," Albus said cautiously as his father sat down beside him, holding his hand out for the ball. The youngest passed it over and watched his dad turning it softly in his hands. "I want to sometimes, but I don't."

Harry nodded slowly, tossing the ball into the air with a flick of his wrist and catching it again a split second before it fell out of possible reach. He glanced across to Albus who was watching on in childlike awe.

"You don't always have to like the people you love," he said. "It's when you stop loving them that the problem comes." Al nodded slowly.

"Do you ever wish you could stop?"

For a moment, Harry looked as though his son had asked him to commit murder. The look of understanding on his face settled in then and he shook his head.

"Never." Each syllable was heavy, weighted with the conviction etched on his features. "Do you?"

"No." It was truth. Even if James had murdered someone, it wouldn't make him stop loving him. They were kin. Flesh and blood. The brothers so different on first glance, yet really the same person underneath, the same person taking two paths spiralling away from each other.

"Not even after what he did?"

Albus shook his head. He could feel the back of his neck twinge with the vigour. He hadn't thought of it before. He had seen his brother as a thieving liar, a traitor to his family. He had gone after him for his sister's sake; so many years of saving for the future she had dreamt of, the future Al had always felt James was jealous of. He lacked imagination. Where Lily was abstract as they came, James always held onto the concrete. Al wandered between them, hands outstretched between the physical and the emptiness of wandering thought. He had thought he could bridge the gap again. That was why he did it. It was stupid of him in the first place.

_"You _fucking_ bastard."_

_It came out in a roar he didn't know he had in him. James turned slowly, reluctantly. On his back, a rucksack filled to the brim with things that as far as Al was concerned, didn't belong to him: his mother's food, his father's books, his clothes, and most importantly, their little sister's money. _

"_Go home." He said it wearily, his voice dejected and steady. Albus stumbled further forward, protest not quite forming on his lips. "Al, go home."_

"_Where are you going?"_

"_Nowhere." Everywhere, away, it had spoken louder than anything in his words. Al stepped forward again. James didn't recoil or turn away. He didn't Disapparate. He stood fast in his spot and stared his little brother down. "Just leave me be."_

"_Not until you give me that."_

_He was close enough now to swipe at the bag, but as soon as his hand was in the air, James had knocked it back. He tried again but his brother grabbed it and twisted it tight enough that it hurt but not enough to do any damage._

"_Go." He shoved him away and Al tripped on the uneven tarmac of the road, broken and shattered from the coldest winter on record last year. The council kept saying they'd fix it. They never did. Staying upright, at least, Albus pulled out his wand. James had laughed meekly. "Don't even think it."_

"_Give me her money and I'll leave you be."_

"_Dad'll just replace it, you know he will," James said as though it was a response. His brother shook his head, lowering his wand arm to raise his eyebrows in disbelief. "What?"_

"_So the fact she worked for countless summers to earn that doesn't mean a thing? Dad'll just give it to her anyway?"_

"_That's not what I meant."Albus' anger was starting to twinge inside him. He could feel his heart beating quicker, his face flushing. Around his wand, his hand tightened again. "You won't understand. Just go home." It didn't need an answer. The refusal was written on his younger brother's face. James stared blankly at him for a moment before turning his back. Shifting the rucksack straps so they sat more comfortably, James began to walk away. Albus could feel his heart beating. Lily's voice, Lily crying, Lily shouting in his head and he knew he had to something, anything._

"_Petrif-"_

_He didn't finish the spell. He saw James's wand hand twisting behind him, the flash of red and then black._

It was funny what thinking about things properly could do. Now, he saw James not arrogantly flaunting his triumph in his face but a dejected, saddened, maybe even hurt nineteen-year-old boy walking away from a family he most certainly did love. He'd got it all wrong. Every memory before had been twisted by anger, by disbelief. He had invited James' spell. He had taunted and pressured and pushed him towards it.

"Al?" His father's voice once again made him jump and Albus sighed. "I'll leave you be." Harry tossed the Snitch back into his son's hands, the young man just about making the catch. As the door shut, Albus exhaled deeply. Memory was a trickier thing than he'd thought.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten: A Family Touch**

There was something definitely distinctly different about the Rose he was staying with and the Rose he remembered. Still as bossy and grown-up as ever, she now had a scatty, forgetful part to her that resulted in him coming out of the bathroom to see her crawling on her hands and knees looking for something else that she'd managed to lose.

"If you put things away, you know you wouldn't have this issue?" James said as he glanced around for his wand to dry his hair off with. Picking it up off the top of the coffee table, he glanced at the magazine underneath. "Never knew you read this trash," he said, flapping the copy of Witch Weekly in her direction. She glanced around.

"Not mine," she said. "Ella's."

"Ella?"

Last he'd heard, his cousin was definitely straight and definitely didn't keep things her friends left cluttering up her paperwork. She might have become a little untidy, but she was very strict on all the mess in question being hers. He'd been allowed a small bit of floor space near the bookcase to pile his few possessions but anything that crept towards her organised chaos was threatened with fire.

"Yeah," she replied, looking over her shoulder as she felt under the chair. "Elle?" There was a second scuffling noise and from the other side of the settee and a blonde head popped up. "Meet James. James, Ella." The girl smiled and stood up properly. She was small by comparison to him and she stumbled around the sofa to hold her hand out to shake.

"Nice to meet you," she said. He nodded with a smile.

"Likewise."

"I've lost a report." She didn't sound especially concerned. Her voice was lilting, Scottish. He'd always found the accent fairly annoying but hers was softer, less abrasive. "I think I might have left it here last week."

"Let me help," he said, pulling out his wand. He tried every variation on a Summoning spell he could think of but nothing brought the right piece of paper. James sucked on his lip from the paper cut he'd had from his first – completely moronic, to quote Rose – attempt with _Accio Paper._ She'd said he deserved it. He'd given her the finger when Ella wasn't looking.

"Are you _sure_ you didn't take it to work?" he asked, getting to his feet and running his hand back through his dusty, dirty hair. She stood up too, wiping her forehead and looking around hopelessly as Rose flattened herself to the floor and swept her hand under the bookcase.

"Yes," she said. "Fairly." Rose turned and narrowed her eyes. "This was the last place I remember having it."

"Why did you let her have it anyway?" James asked, ignoring Rose's huffing and turning to Ella who had seated herself on the arm of the sofa and was chewing on one of her nails. She looked startled to see him talking to her.

"Rose checks it all through for me before I hand it to my editor," she said and the presence of the magazine made sense to him then. She was a journalist. "Makes sure I'm not being too academic for the readership." He laughed lightly.

"She should be working for the bloody Prophet," Rose grumbled, sitting up and tapping her fingers on her knees. "Not writing about why seeing a Manticore at one o'clock will bring death knocking upon your family's door."

"Not true, by the way," Ella added, "but anything to keep them happy." James gave a small laugh but the blonde had already looked away. "Don't worry. It'll turn up. We've got another day yet." She stood up and grabbed her magazine and a small stack of purple parchment from underneath it that James hadn't noticed earlier. "I'll see you later," she said. "Bye James."

He echoed a goodbye and watched Ella disappear out of the door. Rose tutted and started putting all her furniture back together, siphoning off any dislodged dust with her wand.

"Is she okay getting home?" James asked, still watching the door. Rose laughed and kicked his pile of stuff further into the shadow of the bookcase.

"Eyes back in your head," she said. "She only lives downstairs."

She collapsed on the sofa and he smirked. Rose was less uptight these days too. There was a time when she would be the one seated primly on the edge of her chair whilst the others sprawled and fought and sat three to a seat in their grandparents' home. She had been his best friend, once. He couldn't remember what had happened. Time, natural separation, the personality clash, all of it had probably contributed to the replacement of a thousand childhood memories by the more vivid, more recent, more adventurous years at Hogwarts with Dominique and those that had seemed so much more exciting.

The three days had passed a little awkwardly, in all truth. He had been relegated to the sofa and every day, they had to hide his blankets under her bed in case someone arrived unexpectedly. He had loitered around the flat during the time Rose was in work and when she got home, he sat quietly in the sitting room whilst she cooked or worked or read. Now it was Saturday morning and he was starting to get bored of clothes that were hanging off his frame and not getting so much as a gasp of fresh air. Ella had been the first human being he'd seen that wasn't Rose since the wedding, and the first he wasn't related to for an age. It had been refreshing.

"Rose?" he asked as she flicked idly through the pages of whichever book was lying on the coffee table. She glanced up and nodded for him to continue. "I think I might go into town." She stopped turning the pages and looked up properly. He raised his eyebrows. "If that's okay?"

"I'm not your guard dog," she said. "With what money, out of interest?"

"I'm not going to nick your purse out of your knicker drawer while you're not looking, don't worry," he said, his voice tight and defensive. She rolled her eyes and shook her head.

"I wasn't implying that," she said before adding, "though I'd rather you nicked it off me than nicked something from a shop."

He stood up, hoisting his trousers and running his hand back through his hair, realising with a jolt he smelled like a bookshop and that his newly washed hair had turned a dusky brown rather than its normal heavy black. He didn't say anything to Rose's comment, just walked past and locked himself in the bathroom again.

Under the spray of the shower, he found it easier to think. Rose had turned up at that pub, where he was so off his face he couldn't even remember name, and dragged him back to hers. It made no sense. He had barely spoken a word to her since they were thirteen and suddenly, she had become his knight in shining armour. He shuddered. Bad choice of words; he wasn't anyone's damsel in distress.

Sometimes, he thought he was a bad person. Not in that way that most people think of themselves from time to time, after they've dumped someone or fallen out with a friend, but a properly, deep down inside rotten man. Man. He scoffed. He definitely wasn't that.

In two and a half years, he'd forgotten why he'd left in the first place. Even coming back hadn't triggered it to start but now he recognised the guilt from the wedding was settling in and so were the memories. He hadn't meant to do hurt anyone. He hadn't meant to hurt himself and yet that was exactly what he'd done. He had changed himself, moulded himself to fit different people's expectations and it had torn him apart. What was wrong became okay and what was erring on the wrong side of caution became an invitation, and he had drank and smoked and woken up in more beds than he cared to count in more countries than he could remember.

But the money had to run out eventually. He'd come back for lack of anywhere else to go. His friends had gone forgotten. His past girlfriends had moved on. He only had family and to face them was to face the reason he was how he was. He hadn't expected it to hit so hard.

"James?" The rap on the door was sharp and he jumped, realising he'd been standing under the water for ten minutes and not so much as picked up the soap. He turned it off and called back. "Someone here to see you."

"Give me ten," he said, his voice crackling and before Rose could reply, he turned the shower back on. Nobody knew where he was. Nobody could know. Rose had said it herself; she was putting herself in a precarious position by letting him lodge there. He had said it made him sound like a fugitive. She hadn't laughed. He didn't blame her. It wasn't funny, no matter how many times he tried to lighten the mood.

Unless, of course, the journalist downstairs had in fact been after more than just that report. He felt a sudden surge of anger. Of course. She'd have heard the new voice drifting through ceiling and come to investigate. Report; he'd bet good money she'd known where it was all along. Even if Rose hadn't mentioned his surname, his Christian name and the physical similarity to his father would have given it away. She could have sent word straight round to whichever member of his family she thought most in need of telling, ready to hit the front page with an exclusive: Potter's Prodigal Son Returns: Fireworks and Fisticuffs.

Regardless, he got dressed quickly into his own clothes from the wedding, the shirt white and the trousers neatly pressed. He ran a towel through his hair and checked the mirror. He looked fairly presentable, ready to take a punch at any rate. If Rose could get all those food stains out of it, the blood would be easy as anything.

James opened the door and started. His grandmother was patting Rose's hand gently in the middle of the room and at the sound of the door opening, both had turned. Molly looked older than he remembered; her hair practically all white, her wrinkles deeper, her teeth yellower as she smiled at him. She started to move towards him, her arms outstretched but her pace was slow and he crossed the room quickly to hug her.

It all became obvious. His grandmother had told Rose to sort everything out. If there was one person amongst the dozens in his family that would never turn her back on him, it was her. She softly rubbed his back and every time he went to let go, she held on tighter, with surprising strength for a woman her age, he noted silently. He promised himself the third time she clung tighter that he was twenty-two and wouldn't cry but then she let go and he could feel his eyes stinging. Rose had disappeared; he hadn't seen where but he assumed she'd left the flat from the fact that her book was still on the sofa.

His grandmother took his hand and eased them both down next to each other on the settee. She didn't let go of her grip on him and when he looked at her properly, spied the tears in her eyes too.

"You were never a bad boy," she said softly, squeezing his hand. "Not really." He nodded. There weren't currently any words. He could try but every time, he came up with nothing but another urge to cry. He wasn't going to. He hadn't cried since he was nineteen. "They'll come round. They will."

"Dom won't."

"Dominique," Molly said sternly, "is like her mother. She's stubborn and protective and she can hold a grudge. But she loves you." James went to protest, looking away and shaking his head in disbelief, but a pull on his hand made him turn back. "She does. She might hate you at the minute and I would too, but deep down, she cares."

"You think?"

"I know," she said. "I know all of you, and your mum, your dad, Albus, Lily, they'll come round." She paused and looked around. "You've already got Rose on side, and we all know how difficult she can be." He laughed lightly. It was true. If you got Rose on your side, you were normally set to win, regardless of the subject at hand. This, though, this didn't concern Rose. This concerned his parents and siblings and even if he had Rose and his Nanna on his side, it wasn't enough. He had to convince them alone. He had to explain himself as best he could and be sure of what he was saying. He had to do more than just that. He had to change.

-::-

Rose knocked on her parents' door lightly before letting herself in. Saturdays were usually spent at the Potters' and she wouldn't be at all surprised if that wasn't where her mum and dad had spent the majority of the last week. The house smelled of fresh linen, the air circulating lightly through the rooms comfortably, a welcome break from the sticky outside.

"Hello?" she called, but her voice died on her ears. She was alone.

It was obvious whose room her mum had put James in as soon as she saw it. There were dirt marks across the skirting board, footprints on the floor and some of the drawers weren't properly shut. Her heels clicked on the floor sharply and she winced as she opened the drawers. Empty. Every single one, empty. There wasn't the slightest sign of his trunk, his bag, not even his blasted owl. She was sure he said he'd stayed there.

She sat down on the bed that she had grown up with. Her parents had tried countless times to change it but there had been something magical about it, her first bed, that she had always protested and now, it was kept to maintain the same ambiance as the days when this was home. She smiled. She'd changed. They all had. There was no way she could keep anything in her flat looking quite so white and elegant. She'd grown accustomed to disorganisation over the past two years. Her ex had thrived on mess, on a chaotic order to his life and she had learned from that that it was not necessary for her to worry about every last crumb and that a little bit of paper sticking out from a book wasn't the end of the world.

Maybe she'd taken it a bit too far now, she thought, thinking back to that missing report, but she liked it.

The mattress underneath her was soft. She had always slept soundly at home, never a sleepless night. Perhaps that was because her youth had been relatively trouble free or maybe it was just a good bed, she wasn't sure. She lay back, settling into the neat position she had found most comfortable and closed her eyes.

The last few days, she'd not slept more than a few hours. Every slight movement she thought was James leaving and the thought of having to explain to her grandmother that she'd failed her made her feel ill. He wasn't that bad. She hadn't seen him so much as glimpse at a bottle of wine or show any interest in leaving since he'd sobered up. He didn't have problems. He was merely accustomed to it. He'd been helpful, quiet, sombre, even. There was an air of dejection in his walk. He seemed lost. Maybe that's what he was.

The eternal boy faced with manhood and the throbbing realisation that after all that time, after striving for so long to avoid reality, he'd accidentally trapped himself in a dead end with only two escapes: back the way he came, through the stolen kisses in Croatia and the beer in Brazil, or up and out, soaring over everything until he landed back home. He was confused, torn, lost.

She opened her eyes.

It was up to her to get him out.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven: Stage One**

Dominique lowered her wand as the last of the photo frames slipped itself neatly onto the wall in front of her. Their house was small and now almost every wall surface was covered in photos and paintings, every table with vases and ornaments, three carriage clocks lined up on the mantle. They'd decided only to keep them up for a month, until the hype around their marriage had worn off. She didn't like clutter.

When Louis had finally woken up, midway through the day after the night they all wished to forget, she had squeezed him in a hug tighter than he'd ever had before and only reluctantly let go when he'd started physically pushing her away. He'd popped over every day since, though, armed with a new series of insults for James and several offers of murder.

"It's fine," Dominique said on Sunday afternoon as they congregated in their parents' house for Sunday lunch. Fleur was fussing about in the kitchen, muttering under her breath in French that Dominique was fairly sure was just a list of insulting words about the English and their tasteless, heavy food. Teddy and Victoire were getting some alone time in the garden and had left their two young children under the semi-watchful eye of Dominique and Louis. "I don't want you getting yourself banged up for that twat."

"Language," her father called from the hallway. He shut the front door and poked his head around into the living room. "You're a bad influence on those kids."

"Josie's _one_," she protested, bouncing the baby gently on her lap and pressing a soft kiss onto the child's head. She glanced around. "And Rémy's not listening to us anyway." She gestured to behind an armchair where a small pair of feet were sticking out, clad in stripy blue socks complete with a hole in the heel. Bill lifted his granddaughter off Dominique's lap and raised his eyebrows.

"Beside the point," he said as he grabbed Rémy's attention and offered him a piggyback around the front garden. The three-year-old's giggle was high and soft and he ran to find his shoes obediently. "I don't think Victoire would forgive you if her daughter's first word was twat."

"So you can say it," Louis said, raising his eyebrows, "but we can't?"

"Yeah," Bill said as though it was the simplest thing in the world. "Something like that." He grinned and left before either of his children could protest further. Louis scowled.

"Don't get your knickers in a twist," Dominique said, nudging him with her elbow. His face didn't change. "James, still?"

"I just don't get it. I knew he was always spiteful but –" Louis trailed off, hunching over and rubbing his eyes.

His sister sighed softly. Louis was the same age now as James had been when he'd left but they were so different. She knew as he sat beside her, trying to comprehend what he'd thought as a mid-teen to be a bit of a flounce and nothing more, he was putting himself in James's position. Nobody really knew what had triggered it. He'd turned from the charming, cocky clown that Dominique had been proud to call her best friend into something that she didn't even want to acknowledge she was related to. She was no longer upset about the wedding. It was, after all, just the reception and Louis had paid her back twenty times over with his work on the presents. She was angry that she'd forgotten what James was like. She was annoyed that he would still resort to the lowest point before admitting he was wrong. He had to surpass the unthinkable before adjusting his viewpoint.

"He's James," Dominique said after the silence swelled even greater, suffocating them both tightly. It was as if it explained it all and in a way, it did. Louis exhaled and pushed himself to his feet.

"I'm going to see if Maman needs any help."

He drifted out of the door with grace that Dominique had always envied. Her own gait was sturdy, unfeminine, Weasley all over. If she could change one thing about herself, she'd always said it would be her walk.

That, and the fact that in spite of everything he'd done, she still loved James Potter.

-::-

"I'm really sorry," Rose said, pulling on her jacket and looking around for her other shoe. James kicked it towards her and he dug his hands deep into his pockets. He shook his head dismissively. It wasn't her fault. There was very little she could do. Sundays in their youth had been the day of the week they spent with their individual families. The Potters didn't contact Rose's family all day, Dominique's family wouldn't so much as poke their heads into the Floo to check on Percy's troupe and even if anyone tried to check on George, Angelina, Fred and Roxanne, they'd have found the place empty. With two adults incapable of cooking, they spent most Sundays at The Leaky Cauldron, dining on Mrs Abbott's finest Yorkshire puds and the best gravy in London (according to Uncle George, at any rate).

"I'm sure I can get by," he said. "I'll go for a walk or something."

"If you're sure," she said. "Be safe."

"And you," he said, rolling his eyes at her maternal side coming out. She screwed up her nose and stuck her tongue out. He grinned as she stepped into the green flames awaiting her in the grate and he watched her disappear before his eyes.

He collapsed heavily onto the sofa. His head was killing him. He was too grateful for Rose putting him up to even think about complaining but he wished she'd picked something a little longer and a lot softer. The arms were worn and the padding flattened; it was like sleeping on a wooden box. Every time he turned over, he had to grab hold of the chest masquerading as a coffee table to keep himself from falling onto the floor and if he moved too quickly, the sheets would tangle between his legs and he'd have to spend a bleary-eyed five minutes trying to sort it out.

He was, at least, now sure of what he had to do. His grandmother's words had sunk heavily into him and if he'd been civil and polite to Rose before, he was now broaching on being friendly and gentle.

When they were little, James had asked Aunt Hermione if she would swap Rose for Lily because she was more fun. Lily was small and couldn't do anything except cry and smile. Rose was funny. Rose made him laugh and when Rose cried, he felt sad not angry. Aunt Hermione had smiled nicely and told him things didn't work like that. He'd walked away sniffling and had to find a way to break the bad news to Rose. She was four months (and thirteen days) younger than him but she had laughed and said, "It doesn't work like that, silly. Your mummy is your mummy and my mummy is mine. We can't just swap them." He had thought about it all that evening. His dad had remarked that he was quiet. James had merely swung his legs and shrugged. He'd told Rose he'd understood even though he hadn't. Lily was crying again. It didn't make sense. Rose wouldn't cry. Rose never cried. Well, only when she got dirty but it wasn't very often. Lily cried all the time.

It wasn't until he went to bed that night that he thought he'd understood. Albus was his brother, he wasn't his friend. Lily was his sister but she wasn't his friend either. Rose was his friend because they didn't have the same mummy and daddy. James had rolled over triumphantly and fallen straight asleep, all troubles gone away.

He hadn't graced the Rose of the here and now with his plan yet. He had to change and since she was one of the very few people in England that were willing to talk to him, he would have to ask for help. He knew it would take a long time before he gained everyone's trust back. He knew he still had to fix the reason he'd gone in the first place. He had a hundred apologies to make and he didn't even know where to begin.

If he was being frank, he thought he'd changed a lot already. He'd not given in to a single craving for beer, late at night doing nothing in the living room and he'd cut down his cigarette consumption by at least half. There was a lethargy to him now instead. Getting up and going to the shop was a hassle, going outside for a fag involved getting seen wearing those ridiculous clothes, and he had enough problems with the women in his family, let alone bringing one who was unrelated into the mix.

Yet, his mind flickered to the noise of furniture scraping downstairs. Did Ella really count as another woman? He glanced down to the coffee table where one of Rose's books was lying and he perused the blurb before slamming it shut. It was way out of his league. He stood up. He wasn't sure whether it was rude to just knock on an almost complete stranger's door without invite but he stood up, grabbed the house keys and wandered downstairs anyway. He had nothing to lose. The worst that could happen was that she told him her boyfriend was in and turned him away. Or turned him away without mention of her boyfriend, even; that was an option too.

He stood in front of the door for two minutes before knocking and he was tempted to just leg it back upstairs as soon as he had. Ella was clever. If Rose could appreciate that, it was undeniable. She'd probably hear the thundering footsteps and think him some kind of child. He wanted to at least try and get off to a good start with her.

When she opened the door, he found every word he ever knew melted into one line of complete nonsense in his mind. "James," she said and he smiled. "What can I do for you?" She had barely opened the door. It definitely didn't look like she wanted a visitor. His sense came surging back at her quizzical stare and he shook his head.

"I was just – well, Rose is out and I'm bored stupid. I was just wondering if you fancied a chat."

It sounded really rather together, for someone who was unaccustomed to having to make real conversation with a girl. Usually a flash of his teeth, an offer of a drink and a snog against the bar tended to do it for him. This girl wasn't out looking for a bit of totty to go home with. This was a home visit. It was completely different. Ella looked at him for a moment, as though she was trying to figure him out and then opened the door.

"Come in," she said, pulling the door wide and gesturing for him to come in. He went to take his shoes off but noticed he'd not even bothered putting any on. His socks looked ridiculous on his feet, woolly and thick and like something he'd seen his grandpa wear. He hoped she wouldn't notice. "Tea?"

"Love some," he said, before something in the back of his mind twigged and reminded him with a thud that he didn't even like tea. Feeling too stupid to correct his mistake, he dug his hands in his pockets. Her flat was bigger than Rose's. There was an extra bedroom, by the look of things, and the kitchen had twice as much floor space as the one upstairs. He glanced around. If he'd thought Rose's flat a mess, it was nothing compared to this. He had to wonder how many mugs she owned. Every surface he looked at seemed to have one – buried under parchment, used as a quill pot, balanced precariously on top of the sofa – and he could barely even see for paper.

"I'm really sorry about the mess. It's always like this on deadline day," she said, sounding apologetic. He didn't get time to brush it off. "Sit down if you can find somewhere." There was the sound of china meeting china and then the pop of a tin. She hurried into the living room, setting a tray with a teapot and a plate of biscuits on it down on the floor, the only place that it was even possible to lay it. "Would you believe this was impeccably clean not forty-eight hours ago?" she said, her voice light and airy.

"Am I disturbing you?" he said, suddenly aware that deadline day must have meant now. She shook her head and poured his tea for him, handing him the cup and saucer delicately.

"No, deadline passed about an hour ago. I was just going to tidy and then shower."

"I can help, if you like?" he offered and then blushed as she gave a low chuckle, dirtier than he'd have thought. When, he thought to himself, had he become a bumbling idiot? He sounded like Hugo, for Merlin's sake. "I'm a whizz with domestic spells." It wasn't a lie. It was perhaps a mild exaggeration but he was a damn sight better than either of his siblings at them. She contemplated it for a moment and then smiled.

"It'd make me enjoy this a lot more," she said, gesturing between them. "I can't concentrate with mess."

He gave a small laugh and pulled out his wand. Together, they made their way across the room, their conversation forming over the top of their spell work. It was only when they'd stopped the cleaning and settled back down that they realised their tea was stone cold. She offered to make them a second brew but he shook his head.

"I'm probably best getting off. Rose'll be back soon and I don't want her thinking I've been kidnapped." Ella opened her mouth to say something, to pose a question, he thought, but no words came out and she shut it quickly. "I'll let myself out." He stood up. "Thanks for the tea."

"Any time," she said, standing up and following him to the door. "Honestly, come down whenever you like." He smiled a thank you, trailed his hand down the door frame and turned his back on her, taking the stairs two at a time and only looking back when he heard the door shutting.

As soon as he opened the door, Rose flew towards him, looking him up and down and even coming within an inch of him to sniff him. "Hi to you, too," he said, stepping away and looking at her oddly. "Good meal?"

"Too much talk about you and the food wasn't great but what's new?" she said breezily, stepping back and sitting down in the armchair. James nodded. At least Uncle George and Aunt Angelina knew not to even try. Rose's parents refused to give in, yet in thirty or more years of living on their own, they'd still failed to make any impression on anybody's taste buds. "Good time with Ella?" He didn't have time to ask how she'd known. "Her perfume on you."

"Oh right," he said, looking down at his shirt as though he expected the scent to have left a mark. "Yeah, we –" he paused but Rose nodded as if to press on. He thought it best. God only knew what she'd have taken silence to mean. "We tidied." His cousin said nothing for a second as though she was digesting the information then nodded slowly.

"Tidied?"

"Have you seen her place on deadline day? It looked like a bomb had hit in the wake of a tornado." Rose laughed and conceded. "It was just a chat. She's nice."

"She is," she said with a nod. She picked up her book off the coffee table and began to flick through it idly. "Oh, I meant to ask yesterday, where's all your stuff?"

"My stuff?" he asked and she nodded, not taking her eyes off the pages of her book. "At Mum and Dad's."

"Owl included?" James's face paled.

"You don't think they've been starving her, do you?"

"I doubt it," she said. "Do you want me to go and rescue her tomorrow?"

"I could go," he said, though he knew it was one of his stupider suggestions. This was the moment, though. This was when he had to bite the bullet and just ask for the help he thought he might need. Rose went to reply but he cut her off, "I know I'm the last person they want to see but I want to change." She leant forwards in her seat, eyebrows rising as a signal for him to carry on. "I don't want them to hate me anymore."

"Okay."

"And since you and Nanna are the only people talking to me," he said slowly, hoping she'd catch on, "I could probably do with your help."

She looked at him for a moment and he felt like she was looking straight through him. Rose had always been good at the whole people thing. Even if her group of friends was small and select, she knew each of them inside-out and back to front, much based off judgements she'd made during their first few days together. She got people. That was her ithing/i; Lily liked plants, Hugo was a whizz on a broom, Little Molly was the maternal one and Rose, Rose was the people person.

She gave a small laugh and shake of her head. He tilted his head questioningly and she relaxed back in her seat. "I was wondering how long it was going to take you to ask."

She didn't quite finish the sentence. He'd thrown his pillow at her before she had the chance. She smiled; it was a start.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve: The First Apology**

"So what's the plan?" Rose said when she got home from work on Monday evening. James started from his position on the sofa, flicking idly through a copy of a Muggle paper he'd ventured out to the corner shop to buy with the pound he'd found on the pavement. Muggles, he had decided, were decidedly less interesting than wizards. A missing dog? The day a missing dog got onto the second page of the Prophet was a sad day for magical kind.

"Plan?" he said, folding up the paper and dropping it on the floor, on top of his lunch plate and breakfast bowl. He'd wash them up later. She poked her head around the bedroom door, undoing her earrings and nodding as he sat up.

"Plan for your big change. I thought you'd have been having a think about it."

"I don't bloody know," he said darkly. It was true. He didn't even know where to start. They were all so different. Lily was going to be a nightmare but he thought he might win Victoire or Lucy over more easily. Should he start easy and progress up? Or was it best to just bite the bullet and aim at those he'd hurt most directly? Rose sighed and shuffled into the living room.

"Well, I'll cook dinner and you think, and then we'll talk about it," she said. "I'm not doing all the legwork. I'm not as much as a pushover as I used to be."

He rolled his eyes, glad she had turned her back on him. She had changed, he'd give her that, but still she had still taken the bare minimum of convincing to take him in. His memories of the wedding day were scattered and blurred but he knew he hadn't spent long in that pub. He'd barely even taken a few sips of his pint when she'd rolled up.

"Okay," he called. It was best not to rile up one of the few allies he had managed to gain, even if it was out of duty to someone else that had made her do it. She wasn't so averse to him, anyway. He'd barely heard an insult since he arrived. She was properly on side, very little reluctance about her, and that was definitely something to start up this fire with. Rose didn't much like conflict. She knew the ways of avoiding it, of twisting words in a way that seemed sympathetic and polite not controlling and angry. It had been her most frustrating quality in their youth, as far as James was concerned, but now he knew he could use it for his advantage.

Preparing dinner didn't take long. If Rose's parents were bad cooks, it had been passed down to their children. Her entire repertoire consisted of something on or in pasta, and occasionally a batch of chips. Today, he'd struck lucky with Spaghetti Bolognese out of a packet. It was at least edible. The pair of them sat down at the tiny table, both of their plates overlapping the end of the surface. The flat wasn't really built for two people. James had to wonder how she'd ever managed to live there with that ex-boyfriend of hers; it'd probably explain the break-up, at any rate.

"Any thoughts?" she said, dabbing a tissue across her lips to try and get rid of the sauce staining her mouth. He shrugged, his mouth filled to the brim with pasta. "I'm not just going to spoon-feed you the solution," she paused, "there isn't just one way of doing it."

"I know." He took a big gulp of water and looked down at his plate. "I just don't – everyone's changed and I don't even know where to start."

She nodded and they sat in silence for a moment as they both chewed slowly on their mouthfuls. Rose looked like she was thinking, her eyes looking firmly at her plate, her eyebrows twitching and head tilting as she ran through different options in her mind.

"Who would you have started with before, given the chance?" she asked after an age.

"Dominique." There was no hesitation. If he'd not done what he'd done, it'd have been easy to slip his way back in through her. She had power, she had influence; people listened to Dominique, though he'd never really understood why. They just did. "Or Victoire."

"I think that's your better option," Rose said. James nodded, spooning another mouthful of spaghetti into his mouth.

"Who would you have picked?"

"Victoire," she said. "Victoire or Fred, one of them."

Fred; he'd almost forgotten about him. As kids, they'd never got on terribly well. They vied for the attention, for the role as the clown. When they'd grown up a bit, they realised they were too different types of people. Fred was born to make people laugh because he could. He wasn't into the big pranks, the farcical stuff that his father had been famed for. He had a dry, sarcastic sense of humour that James had always envied. James, on the other hand, tried. He wasn't naturally funny. He insulted and mocked and offended people to make others laugh. He had been a bully. Fred had told him so on several occasions but the long-rooted jealousy between them had prevented James from taking it too seriously.

He sighed. "Victoire it is." Now it had been decided, spoken out loud and agreed, he felt the nerves starting to stir in his stomach.

He glanced down to his plate and smiled. Maybe it was just Rose's cooking.

-::-

He stood in front of the mirror in the ridiculous clothes he'd inherited from Rose's bloke and groaned. He'd not been serious when he said he was going to go and get his stuff from his parents' house. He'd intended to ask Rose to do it at some point for him but it had slipped his mind and now it was Tuesday and she was in work.

He looked like he was drowning in the elephant sized t-shirt and not even a belt could keep the jeans up this time. His eyes flickered to the clock. It was only half twelve. He had told himself he'd leave for Victoire's at one. He was showered, his hair was halfway decent and he had even had a proper shave. All he'd need to do was sneak home – hoping that they still kept the spare key under one of the Muggle gnomes that hid under the shade of the porch – go inside, grab his bag and leave. It wouldn't even take five minutes.

And yet, he'd been debating it for an hour now and he still couldn't find the courage to do it. He'd wondered a few times whether Ella might have something that might fit, something kept from an ex like Rose or maybe she knew someone his size. However, explaining why he didn't have clothes would mean explaining the entire story and that would be risky. He was definitely the worst Gryffindor ever, he thought, scowling into the mirror and feeling a soft sinking sensation as his shoulders slumped a bit. His father had broken into Gringotts, for goodness' sake. He could sneak into a cottage.

With an emphatic nod, he made up his mind. Grabbing his copy of the front door key and his wand off the table, he walked away from the mirror, out of the door and downstairs. A little unsteadily, he Disapparated and when he appeared on the lane he'd known so well, once, he felt a surge of confidence.

Five minute job. He'd done plenty of those before in houses he knew less well than this one. Nobody would be home. It was Tuesday.

Still, upon lifting the gnome up and removing the protective charm on the key, he cast a quick, "Homenum revelio," for signs of life. Nothing. Not a soul. It was just him in this house and he shut the door quietly behind him. He didn't want to stay too long. The accusations would fly and that was the last thing he needed.

He took the steps two at a time and threw his bedroom door open. It was empty. His trunk and bag had been there. He remembered them being there. There was no sign of anything that could have been his. Shutting the door, he went through every room in the house and all he found was, eventually, in the shed, Beryl. The bird went berserk at the sight of him and flew more obediently than ever onto his shoulder. She'd been fed and watered, he knew that much, and the other owls all looked at him in vague recognition, if owls could recognise faces, that is. He ran a finger down the bird's body and smiled.

"You know where Rose lives," he said and the bird gave what might have been perceived as a nod but was definitely affirmation.

He turned back to the house and in the kitchen, pulled out his wand. He tried every variation on the Summoning spell he could think but there was nothing; not even a rustle of something trying to escape. It was gone. It was all gone. The clothes, the souvenirs, the little money he did have, the bottles, all of it had been thrown out or given away or hidden.

He looked down to the garden. Beyond the outhouse, where the land boundary became dubious and the protective enchantments of the Potters' house ended, was a field. Normally as green as the richest emerald, it was different now. Shutting everything behind him, he walked down past the patio, past the owls, past the vegetable patch that Lily had so loved. He felt the magic break as he crossed the border and looked down.

A patch of grass the colour not of his brother's eyes but of their hair: black, burnt to a cinder, and in the middle, all that was left was a mangled, blackened padlock. He let out one low laugh, edged in disappointment, in disbelief and pulled out his wand. He Disapparated without even looking around. Nobody was there to see. None of them cared and so, in turn, nor did he.

-::-

Rose pushed heavily on the front door of her flat and groaned. She needed to fix the hinges. They were starting to stick and it was getting nigh-on impossible to open it without putting her shoulder out. Her eyes flickered to the sofa but it was empty. She smiled. It was the first day she'd arrived home and not seen her cousin slumped on it as though it was all he had. Things with Victoire must have gone well.

She had to admit that she hadn't expected it. Putting her bag down and shrugging her work robes off in her room, she felt a surge of pride for James and for herself. She'd had her doubts, she had to admit, when he'd asked for her help and when she'd offered it in reply. She had evidently underestimated the others. Perhaps they felt as she realised she had: obligated to show disdain towards him in spite of the reality. She'd always thought it was funny, what one person's opinion could do, how much it could change things.

Unpinning her brown hair from its tight bun, she tugged a brush through it and glanced at the clock. Her stomach was rumbling. James would be back, she decided, if he wanted feeding. Victoire had probably offered him something. She glanced in the fridge and sighed. She'd always wished she could cook but Owen had always been protective of his kitchen and her parents were no example. Hugo had asked their Nanna to teach him and he could whip up a decent shepherd's pie in no time. She thought she might do the same, if she ever found the time. For now, pasta and tomato sauce it was.

As always, average. Her taste buds were fairly displeased but her stomach seemed content and so she washed down the last mouthful with a healthy swig of wine. She glanced to the clock again. It was almost seven and still no sign of James. She bit her lip and checked her watch. It was definitely right.

It took her less than five minutes to decide that she'd make a quick Floo call to check he was okay. She pulled James's pillow off the sofa and nestled herself in front of the fire before sticking her head into the green flames.

Victoire's living room came into sight and she called out. The room was empty, save for one of the cats which started and dove behind the sofa. "Stupid thing," Rose muttered. "Vic?" There was a scuffling and then her cousin's footsteps – always far heavier than her appearance would have you imagine – coming towards the room. The blonde always looked far too pretty all the time. Rose cursed her.

"What can I do for you?" she asked. Rose realised with a sinking feeling in her stomach that it was now highly unlikely that James was still there and that he might not even have gone at all. So much for a newfound confidence in him.

"Have you had a visitor today?" she managed to say, hoping that wouldn't arouse too much suspicion. Victoire shook her head.

"Not a soul," she said and Rose must have shown her confusion more evidently than she'd have liked because Victoire added, "Why?"

In that moment, Rose thanked her mother for giving her the quick-thinking brain that her father lacked. The story was plotted out in a second, and she only stumbled over her first words.

"Just some reporter came round, asking about Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny," she said. Victoire groaned.

"Divorce rumours again?"

"Yeah," Rose said. "Sorry, I've got to run. I told Fred I'd meet him for dinner."

They exchanged their goodbyes and Rose sat up. The flames turned to nothing and she groaned, running her hand angrily back through her hair. The stupid prat. She grabbed her cloak and her handbag and threw them on haphazardly. She locked her front door behind her and ran downstairs, knocking on Ella's door as she passed.

"You've not seen James, have you?"

It was a blunt welcome but Ella didn't flinch. She glanced to her watch and shook her head.

"He went out at about midday," the blonde said, recalling the bang of the front door and watching him leave from the front window. "Everything okay?" Rose shook her head and groaned. "Want me to come with you?" The brunette thought it over for a moment and then nodded. She could do with any help she could get. There was one more place she had to go to though. She wedged the door of Ella's flat open whilst the girl grabbed her bag and coat, and as soon as she had locked the door, Rose hurried her outside and offered out her arm. Ella took it and together, they Disapparated.

Fred's flat wasn't much better than hers and as soon as he opened the front door, the pair of the stepped in. They had a decent enough relationship. Fred was the least likely to judge of the lot of the Weasley boys, and most of the girls too. It also helped that he knew James's old hangouts. She'd heard many a story about them bumping into each other in a list of pubs that she couldn't recall at all now. It was funny what the mind thought was irrelevant and cast aside like yesterday's news.

"Rose," he said, as surprised as she'd sound if he turned up in her living room looking as flustered and manic as she must have, complete with a slightly dazed stranger. "What's up?"

"James," she muttered. She had to tell _someone_ who knew the full story. Fred was the most trustworthy of the sorry lot of them. He scoffed and she carried on before he could comment. "He's staying with me." She waited for the noise of protest, of disbelief but it didn't come. "I've…well, lost him."

"You've lost a twenty-two year old man?" he asked and she nodded. It sounded quite absurd now it was out in the open. She waited for the lecture, for the refusal but it didn't come. He sat down on the arm of the sofa and she tapped her foot impatiently. It was all very well and good, digesting this very brief bit of information, but James could be lying splinched in a ditch. He wasn't the world's best Apparator at the best of times, let alone drunk or angry.

"Where do you think he'd go?" she said and he shook his head. "Just help us find him, please?"

"Why are you so concerned?" he said, looking at her sternly and then to Ella, who was tactfully stood by the door, admiring a small statue that Rose couldn't quite make out from her seat. She sighed, tapping her fingers on her crossed arms. Fred had always taken things slowly. She'd quite admired him for it, once, but now him understanding her motivation wasn't the most pressing thing.

"Nanna asked me to help him, okay?" she said. Fred's face softened. "If I have to tell her I've failed after a week, I don't know what I'll do."

He stood up, looking from her to his bedroom door and back to her. He exhaled deeply and ran a hand back through his short dark hair. Without a word, he disappeared into the other room and re-emerged with his cloak.

"Half an hour but then I'm coming back. I'm not searching every bloody pub in Britain."

Rose didn't need to say thank you. She just smiled, pulled her wand out of her robes and the two girls followed him until they found a safe point to Apparate from.

It didn't anywhere near as long as either of them had anticipated. It was their fourth try, a small tavern down a dirty back street in Sheffield. Fred said that one of James's friends had introduced him to it, back in the day. They served underage wizards. It had been an instant hit with the Gryffindor boys as soon as the secret was out.

He wasn't propping up the bar and he wasn't anywhere near the gaggle of chattering girls by the door. They almost gave up hope when the barman caught sight of Fred and beckoned him over. Rose stayed firmly out of the way, Ella by her side squeezing her wrist comfortingly. The place was filthy and really, Rose thought she ought to report it and have it shut down. It wasn't until Fred turned slowly towards a corner of the room, near an old unused darts board, that she saw him.

Hunched on the floor was James. His hands were clasped around a glass of half-consumed beer. Every few seconds, he took a swig out of it, his hands trembling. Rose groaned and marched past Fred. "Get up."

She took the glass out of his hand and he didn't protest. Rose glanced over her shoulder. The place hadn't been bustling upon her arrival but it was decidedly still now. Fred stepped forward but James had hugged his legs closer to him, his grip tight on himself.

"I'm not playing this game," she said. "Up." He didn't budge and she gave an exasperated groan, guttural and fuelled with anger. She pushed his arm heavily. "James." She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked to see Ella guiding her out of the way. As she stood up, Rose threw her a questioning look.

"Softly," the blonde said and bent down as if to demonstrate. "James?"

He looked up for the first time and as his face caught the light, Rose wanted to take the words back. He was crying. James didn't cry. He was practically famous for it. James laughed or swore or punched or yelled. He didn't cry. She bent down again, looking up at Fred who was trying in vain to shield him from the view of the others. When he'd sobered up, he'd be ashamed of himself.

"Come on." She kept her voice soft now and hooked her hand around his arm, tugging, but he merely shook his head. "People are looking."

"Don't care," he said. He wasn't slurring. He'd definitely had something, each breath he let out smelled of alcohol, but it wasn't anywhere near as much as she'd seen him with the week before. His breathing was steady but loud as he tried to calm himself enough to formulate the right words. Rose watched as Ella softly stroked her thumb across his hand. "They burned all my stuff."

"What?" Fred said. He'd come closer now and James's eyes flickered over him, barely even registering the presence of a fourth person before looking back to the floor.

"Mum and Dad. All of it, it's gone."

Rose sighed, looking to Fred who just shrugged. It didn't make sense. Harry and Ginny were angry. They were ashamed. She would be too, if James was her son, but neither of them was like that. They were adults, for starters. Grown-up people didn't burn other people's things. It only ever happened in those books that her mother had always said were made specifically to lower the intelligence of the world to make the author feel better about themselves.

"Okay," she said softly. "Let's go home."

Fred bent down and together, the three of them hauled him to his feet. The barman pointed to the fireplace and the girls carefully helped James and Fred inside, the latter holding tight to his cousin who was shaking his head and murmuring what sounded to Rose like nothing but nonsense. They disappeared and Ella placed a Galleon on the bar, for the trouble of the poor staff before following the other two.

Rose's heart sank. She'd never seen him like that. Not in twenty-one years of knowing him had she ever seen him look quite so lost. James had always had a place in the world. He'd always known where he belonged. Seeing him now made her want to demand a thousand things of her godparents, but she had to bide her time. She knew that. She had told Fred because she trusted him. She had told Ella because she needed support. If she told anyone else, there'd be a riot.

Deeming it safe to say that the others were out of the way of her fireplace, she stepped into the grate. When she landed in her living room, gracefully and with her back straight, she watched Fred help James into her bed. He didn't say a word, except passing a pitying smile over James's body, before disappearing out of the front door. Rose watched as Ella helped him strip off his too big clothes and shoes, and she tucked him in tightly.

"I won't tell anyone," Ella said softly, and Rose wasn't sure whether that was aimed at her or James. Neither replied. "Come on. Leave him be." She took Rose's hand and guided her out of the room. On reaching the door, Rose sighed, looking down at her cousin, still awake and still shaking. No words would be enough. She turned around, turned off the light and shut the door.

Tomorrow was another day, another chance. She just had to hope he'd take it.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen: Decision **

"Dinner?" Rose said and he looked up. His smile was small and he shook his head. "Will you just have a bit?" she said. "Come on, Ella bought it and I don't want it to go to waste." He reluctantly took the plate and fork and stabbed at the chips. Putting one in his mouth, he chewed slowly and pointedly. She didn't say anything but sat next to him and picked at her own plate.

"Are you sure you don't want me to go and find out what happened?"

She'd been trying for four days to go and ask his parents what had really gone on but each time she'd been met with the same stoic, "I think we know," and nothing more was said on the subject. This time, he didn't even bother voicing his opinion. He just looked at her and shook his head. It wasn't going to stop her, she decided. She would go over the weekend at some point. It didn't add up.

"You should still go and see Victoire," she said slowly. He didn't say anything but put another chip in his mouth. For someone who'd been saying for days that he wasn't hungry and living off toast, he was practically devouring the meal in front of him. It probably had something to do with the fact that she hadn't cooked it. "What are you going to do?"

"About?"

"About," she said, putting her cutlery down and turning so she could face him, "your currently pretty pathetic life." He livened up at that, turning to face her. "You can't sponge off me and live on my sofa for the rest of it."

"I'm not sponging off you."

They both knew it was a lie but Rose didn't say a thing. She wasn't exactly short on cash. She didn't even mind him staying with her. She appreciated the company. She was fine with being on her own but it wasn't the same as having someone other than her mantelpiece to talk to in the evening. It was him lazing about feeling sorry for himself that annoyed her. He was stubborn, and so was she, and she would win out. She just had to be persistent.

"You told me you wanted to change," she said and he scowled, shoving another chip in his mouth. "That is not going to happen unless you make the effort." He said nothing again. "James, I'm talking to you."

"Oh really?" he said. "I thought you were talking to the owl."

She flipped her hand back and swiped his arm. He jumped, a few chips sliding onto the carpet, and he turned to face her too.

"Will you just grow up?" she said, her voice shrill and she almost cringed for how like her mother she sounded. "You're not fifteen anymore. It's not funny." He picked up the chips and put them on the coffee table. He kept his silence. She slammed her plate down on the table and turned to him. "Why did you go in the first place?" He put another chip in his mouth and she took the plate off his lap before he could react. "Come on, at least tell me that."

He groaned and looked at her.

It was difficult. As far as everyone was concerned, he'd upped and left out of boredom. He'd taken the money to fuel his hedonism, he'd left his brother in a gutter to die and he hadn't written for lack of time. The truth was, he'd written several times, the letters had just never made it to the owl. He'd written three apologies, neatly shaped and honest, but each time, he couldn't bring himself to send them. He didn't want their guilt. He didn't want them to feel sorry for him. He didn't want to go back.

They thought he was how he was because school had changed him. They thought he wanted to be the hero's son. He'd played to the stereotype. To begin with, it had been novel. In a family of three, in an extended family of a dozen, he sometimes got lost. He liked the attention. He appealed to his audience and they had bowed at his feet. How could he complain?

"I wanted out," he said and Rose nodded slowly. She looked like a shrink, he thought, all sympathetic eyes and gentle movements. "I wanted to stop being Harry Potter's son."

"We all feel like that about our parents," she said, truthfully. He knew she was right. It wasn't easy for any of them but he had always taken it to the extremes.

"I fucked up my NEWTs," he said. "I did it on purpose and lo and behold, I still got four Es. It's fucked up. The whole system's a bloody sham." He shook his head. "They were going to promote me at work."

Before he'd left, he'd been in the International Magical Cooperation department. He'd started higher than most recent graduates, especially ones with only Es. Nobody had ever wondered how he'd managed it. He was Harry Potter's child; favours were done where they were needed. James smirked. His father had always impressed on them the need for them to develop their own identities. They were proud of their parents' legacy but still, every job James had applied for, the response had come back with the offer of a position higher than he'd wanted.

"I did fuck all but they'd screwed something up with Austria and they wanted a face higher up," he continued. Rose was picking at her chips again but nonetheless listening intently. "I said no and they said I didn't have a choice. That was when I started pissing about with the girls and the drink."

"You did that at school," Rose said and he laughed slowly.

"Fair," he agreed, "but not like this. I did that to be cool. I did this to get sacked."

"Didn't work?"

"Did it hell." He leant forward and scooped another two chips, soggy from the vinegar, into his hand. "They wouldn't let me leave officially so I had to go. Only, it was a snap decision. I didn't have time to go to Gringotts and deal with all that. They'd have asked questions. I wasn't doing it for the fuss."

"But Lily kept her money in her room," Rose said. It all made sense now. He nodded.

"I was going to pay her back," he said. "Honestly, I was but I just forgot."

When he was away, he was James Evans. He was any other guy. There were Evanses all over the world. It was just a name amongst many, fading into the background. He still needed the attention though. He'd still needed the fuel behind the fire. He'd still liked the thrill of the drink, the tug of a Portkey, the touch of a girl's hand on his. Home was something he remembered and smoked away. Family weren't as fun as Margaux or Giorgia or Sammi.

He hadn't left. He'd run away, a note pinned to the front door.

"And Al?" Rose asked. He shook his head.

"Not my fault. He pulled his wand on me first. I Stunned him and he cracked his head in the fall," he said defensively. "I didn't have time to do anything except get him home and go."

Rose nodded slowly. It was a lot to take in. Everything they'd assumed – that he'd left to feed his new loves, to keep himself entertained, to humiliate them – had been wrong. He'd left for the same reason she often wondered if being Rose Granger or Rose Prewett would be any easier. It was hard. It was so hard and James had cracked first. Even if he'd tried to confide in someone, they'd not have listened. They'd have thought him meek and selfish and cowardly. Perhaps he was, she thought, but if that was the case, so were they all. She knew full well that each of them had dreamt of it, a world where they were more than their surnames dictated. No matter how much their parents strived to shield them from a world that was safe yet still unfair, they would never escape it.

"You're not a bad person," she said after a moment's silence. He scoffed. "You're not. You don't want them to hate you because you love them and I'm not having you sitting here and wallowing forever." She stood up, and held out her hand for his. He frowned and slowly held his out too. She yanked him up and pointed to the fireplace. "Her kids will be in bed. Victoire, now. Fred's on side. You've got two of us down, only nine more to go."

She let go of his hand and held out the Floo powder. He took it tentatively and threw it into the flames. They burned bright emerald and he stepped inside. His voice was clear and resounded through the flat before he twirled away, leaving nothing but an empty grate behind. Rose smiled. It was all making sense, at last.

-::-

Victoire had always hated the Floo network. The very idea seemed so dated and so open. Her family could just walk straight into her living room without invitation and warning and she would have to entertain them. She much preferred Apparating or flying; admittedly, with the children it was now impractical and that was the reason they'd ended up getting connected to the network in the first place.

She made a mental note to get rid of it as soon as possible as she stood in her front room with James Potter smiling sheepishly at her as though he'd simply broken the sink or taught her son a swear word. She stared blankly back and walked past him to the kitchen.

"Can we talk?" he said, following her and she turned. "I want to apologise."

She sighed, picking up the pan she'd been drying upon him landing in her sitting room and scaring her half to death. He had a cheek. He had more than that. She couldn't believe he had the audacity to walk into her home as if nothing was wrong. He hadn't even Apparated. At least then, she could have had the satisfaction of slamming the door in his face.

"For what?"

She knew it was a good question. He'd done nothing to her, not personally. He really had nothing to apologise directly for. If there was anyone in this house he owed an apology to, it was Teddy, who was upstairs getting changed from after work. He'd taken it hard; James had always irritated him within an inch of a slap across the head but he still cared a lot for him. Seeing him disappear with fistfuls of money stolen from his sister had made him feel like a ceiling had crumbled to bits on top of him – a direct quote, she remembered it like it was yesterday. But it wasn't. It was two and a half years and one baby on. She'd bet good money that he didn't even know Josie existed.

He didn't answer her question. He couldn't answer it and she knew full well. Putting the pot carefully but firmly down on the worktop, so as not to wake either child upstairs, she shook her head.

"I've changed."

"People don't change in a week and a half," she said, shaking her head. He seemed to have been caught out because he shook his head so that his hair fell into place and dug his hands into his pockets. "Sort yourself out and come back when you've actually tried." She turned her back and returned to her drying up. He hung around for another few seconds but at the sound of a creak on the stairs, Victoire looked back. "Get out before he sees you."

She was surprised. He nodded solemnly, gave a small smile and disappeared from her kitchen. She heard him give the name of his destination but couldn't make out the words and not half a minute later, Teddy walked into the kitchen. His hair was a mess and he was wearing clothes that didn't flatter him in the slightest but the crooked smile of his teenage years hung off his lips and she felt all anger towards James's appearance dissipate.

"Are you going loopy?" he asked, taking the tea towel off her and finishing her work. She smiled and leant back against one of the worktops. "Could have sworn I heard you talking." Her smile fell a little but she shook her head.

"Didn't say a word," she said. He looked at her a little bit sceptically but took her word for it. Upstairs, there was a shuffle and then a cry. She raised her eyes to the ceiling and sighed. "I wouldn't give it long though."

He laughed, grabbing her for a short kiss before letting her run upstairs. She smiled again as she found her way into her son's room. He didn't even know who James was, she thought as she stroked back his hair and listened to his tales of a vampire under the bed. Lucky thing.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter Fourteen: The First Stage**

He wasn't one to grovel. He especially wasn't one to grovel when it came to work but still he found himself being forced into a pair of new robes by Rose, ready to face his old boss, the one who he'd abandoned without so much as a resignation notice. He wasn't sure the Potter name was going to do him any favours this time round, really. Victoire had been right, though. He and Rose had both agreed on that when he arrived back at the flat. How was he going to convince anyone he'd changed in the space of less than two weeks? It was laughable.

So, they had decided that they needed to get him back on his feet. First things first, he needed to get a job. Then he could move out and start working on everyone again and if all went to plan, they'd all come around to him being back. At the very least, maybe they'd get used to him.

"Just –" Rose started but seemed to run out of words. "Just be confident." It was something he'd never been told to be before. It had always come naturally but now he wanted to be like his brother, for the first time ever. He just wanted to hide in the background. "Go on," she pushed him towards the fire, "you'll be late."

He scowled. He'd been all for the option of just turning up as if the past two and a half years hadn't even happened but Rose had told him that was unprofessional and immature and several other things that he couldn't remember but which were all contributing factors to him allowing Rose to set him up with a proper meeting with old Boot. Feeling like he was going to his death, he stepped into the fireplace and disappeared.

When he Apparated back, not long after, he knew Rose would already have left for work herself. He had, at least, been welcomed back with partially open arms. Apparently there was an opening at the bottom of the ladder, lower down the ranks than when he'd started, and since they'd not found a good enough candidate, Boot had handed him the job with relatively little convincing. He had, after all, travelled a fair bit in his absence and considering the department, the old codger seemed to find it more of a positive than anything else. He would start next Monday.

He practically ran up the path to the front door of the house, throwing it open and almost knocking Ella off her feet. "Sorry," he said hurriedly. She shook her head, laughing to hide the shock and waving a hand dismissively.

"It's fine," she said, looking him up and down and smiling. "You look like the Niffler who got the gold."

"I just got my job back."

It was practically impossible not to smile back. It was the first time he'd said it out loud and it sounded far better than he'd thought it would. He hadn't even had the time to acknowledge that in two weeks, he'd be moaning all over again about how boring it was but for now, the idea was enough. Ella's smile grew and she shifted the mass of paperwork in her arms so that she could give him a quick, one-armed hug. He squeezed her tightly with both arms and she gave a small laugh that trickled down his ear. He let go and she brushed her pale hair out of her eyes.

"Well done," she said. "Cause for celebration?"

"You should come over for dinner tonight," he said, nodding enthusiastically and wondering quite where these words were coming from. "Sevenish. You, me and Rose." The latter was an afterthought but he owed her probably more than he did Ella. In fact, definitely more. The blonde looked at him for a moment, chewing one corner of her mouth before nodding slowly.

"Okay, yeah. I'll rearrange some stuff," she replied. He nodded firmly. "See you later." She gave one last smile before ducking past him and out of the door. He took the stairs up to Rose's flat two at a time and threw open the door with an almost manic laugh. It was daft, really. She was just a girl.

He made a bee-line for the kitchen, opening the fridge and glancing inside. He thought that maybe the problem with Rose's cooking was the lack of any actual decent ingredients but anyway, he wasn't going to let her poison Ella's taste buds. Grabbing the money he'd picked up from Gringotts the week before, he headed out.

Diagon Alley was bustling and as he walked past shop front after shop front, he truly felt as though he'd been missing out. The old Apothecary had been revamped, there were half a dozen new restaurants and there, amongst the rabble, was the constant bang or whizz from his Uncle George's shop. It had always lifted up over the noise of the crowd. He'd laughed as a child at the tourists, those unfamiliar with this hub of magical England, who would jump at every screech or boom that came out of the door.

He wound his way around to the market, hidden away down one of the alleys coming off the main street. The smell of freshly cooked pumpkin pasties and bacon baguettes wafted all the way down it. The money in his pocket burned for a different reason than it had before. He made sure he was quick; if he was seen by too many people, the questions would start to be asked and even though he thought he was well disguised in his work glasses and his hat, there were bound to be stares. He gathered up everything he needed to make a decent curry and as soon as he deemed himself ready, Disapparated.

Rose was impressed, that much was certain. As soon as she'd walked in, he'd noticed that from the sceptical eyes and the way she slowly poked her head into the kitchen. It was a fair enough point, really. The only time he ever ventured in there was to get a drink or talk to her. "What are you doing?" she said, as though it wasn't obvious from the array of dirty dishes and bubbling pans. He turned, showing off the apron and waving the spatula at her.

"I wanted a decent meal and you were never going to give me one." She looked mildly offended but hid it quickly. Unpinning her hair, she peered around him to try and see what was in the pots. He moved and hid them from view. "It'll be ready at seven." She nodded and disappeared into her room, shutting the door. It took her two minutes to come back out, slowly and with her hands crossed over her chest.

"James?" He jumped and turned. "You've invited Ella, haven't you?" He tried his best to look hurt and offended but he didn't do a terribly good job. "I don't i_mind/i_," she said, shaking her head, "but I take it that means you got the job?"

"Yeah," he said as she took her earrings out and slipped her shoes off. "I'll only be an assistant but it's better than nothing." She nodded encouragingly and glanced to the clock.

"If you want, I can go to Mum and Dad's for tea?" she offered but he shook his head. Even if he'd only said it to impress Ella, this was as much a thank you for his cousin as it was a celebration for him. Plus, he wasn't even sure what to say to a girl that he didn't intend on bedding by the end of the night. Rose would provide cover if he got stuck, or at least prevent him from offering to clean her apartment again. "Well, at the very least go and make yourself look a bit more presentable." She flapped a hand at his robes. "You're not taking her to a bloody funeral." He glanced down and sighed.

"I need some new clothes," he said. Rose didn't argue but continued flapping him away. "Just don't touch anything." He didn't even trust her to stir something without screwing it up. He grabbed the jeans he'd inherited from Owen and the white shirt he'd worn to the wedding and shut himself in the bathroom.

As he got changed, he thought back to Victoire. Was simply getting a job really enough? After all, he'd got it back so easily that he wouldn't even be convinced himself that it was a sign of change. For all she knew, he could have flashed his surname in Boot's direction and that was it, sold. She'd settled down but she was five years his elder. She couldn't expect him, at merely twenty-two, to throw his life away yet. He could grow up without love. He could grow up without marriage and children and the other things that people did when they became Official Adults.

His thoughts switched to Ella. A girlfriend. Would that convince his family? It wouldn't need to be for long, after all. She would agree, wouldn't she? She'd done a fair bit for him already. He knew he was charming. He knew he could twist a girl around his little finger if he said the right string of words but there was a throb in his heart. A throb of disgust, he thought. It was tricking himself, tricking his family and tricking Ella. He wouldn't do it to any of them.

He shook his head, his hair falling obediently into the untidy way he'd grown well acquainted with through his life. It was what always gave him away as a Potter. It was the only thing Al had escaped from his father's genes and James smiled. It was at least less irritating than the common simper of, "You have your father's eyes," that his poor younger brother ended up with every time they went out of the house.

His poor younger brother; he'd not thought of him like that for a long time, if ever. He did look on Al with pity, once, but pity for being so dull, so lifeless. His whole manner had always been one of incertitude, of quiet. He wanted to fade into the background when all James and Lily wanted was the stage. His sister had struck lucky with the genes. She had her twenty-twenty eyesight and their mother's eyes and their father's build. Her hair was always neat and it glowed proudly with the Weasley tint. Third time lucky; with Lily, their parents had finally found the balance between the families.

He felt his stomach shifting again with guilt. He had stared around his vault at Gringotts and considered collecting the money and just taking it straight to her. Of course, he'd told himself that would be stupid. He wasn't going to buy them back. It was funny, how money had started it all in the eyes of his family yet it would not be permitted as a solution, as an end. The world was strange.

"Are you going to be in there all night or do I actually have to finish this off myself?" Rose yelled and he started. He'd forgotten about the food. Gathering his robes and yanking the door open, he cast his clothes into the darkened corner of the room with the rest and pushed Rose gently but firmly out of the way, grabbing the spoon from her hand. She scowled and glanced to the clock. His gaze followed her: half an hour. She tutted and disappeared, her bedroom door shutting firmly behind her.

His mind faded back into his own thoughts as he watched everything simmering in front of him. After Victoire, he wasn't sure where he was going to go. Molly was usually a good bet but he was sure Rose mentioned that she was pregnant and when she'd been expecting Imogen, she'd become more thirsty for a fight than a dragon. He didn't fancy being chopped up and used in a stew just yet. He was still young.

He was debating between Lucy and Roxanne when a light knock grabbed his attention and he carefully smoothed down his hair, though knew it was in vain. Balancing the spoon on the edge of one of the pans, he took a deep breath and crossed to the front door, opening it to view Ella cradling a bottle of wine and a stack of paperwork. He looked bemusedly at it and she laughed.

"Thought I'd kill two birds with one stone," she said, smiling as she ducked under his arm to step inside. She had put her jacket on, even just to climb a flight of stairs, and shrugged it off. "Smells amazing."

"Recipe I picked up in Thailand," he said and it wasn't a lie. He felt a surge of pride at being able to say that kind of thing; it made him sound far more educated and exciting than the reality. She handed him the bottle, the widening of her eyes showing that she was suitably impressed, and glanced around. "Rose is just getting changed." She lay her jacket down over the back of the sofa and set her work on one of the cushions. "Drink?"

He nodded towards the bottle, ice cold in her hand, and she held it out.

"I wasn't sure what we were having," she said, almost excusing her choice of white. He nodded, inspecting the label as though he was expecting it to be stamped with a French seal of approval but the name was decidedly English and he felt a little disappointed. "It was on offer at the offy."

He laughed and shook his head as she blushed before him. There was something about her that made him feel more mature. Perhaps it was that she looked so young – he wasn't even sure how old she was, now he thought on it – and he felt he was expected to act like that. Perhaps it was just what his mind did when he felt an attraction to someone without alcoholic stimulation. Or maybe, he was imagining it all.

There was a crash as the spoon he'd balanced on the pan slipped off and he glanced over his shoulder. Excusing himself and gesturing to the sofa, he disappeared behind the kitchen wall and wiped up the mess it had made on the hob. He looked back, just for a second, into the living room where Ella was pushing back her hair and flicking through a couple of pieces of the purple parchment he'd seen her with on their first meeting. He smiled.

He definitely wasn't imagining it. There was something there, something about her that made him like her yet the thought of waking up one morning and walking away without looking back made guilt settle uneasily in his gut. It was like the early days, the feeling of obligation to the girl. A phone number – invented – scrawled on an old till receipt. He'd almost forgotten that was the way of the world.

"Eyes, head, in," Rose said as she obscured Ella from view with the excuse she called hair. He hushed her with a flapping hand and she shook her head. "Need a hand?" she asked as he started pulling cupboards open looking for plates. He scowled.

"Yeah, shut up and entertain our guest." He stressed the two words heavily and jerked his head towards the living room. The blonde was lost in her own little world, sifting through reports and Rose sighed.

"Don't break anything," she said as he yanked three of the good plates from the bottom of the pile. He flicked two fingers at her but she'd already turned to the settee and the sound of the two of them talking was obscured by half a foot of brickwork and the sound of something bubbling away. With a flick of his wand, the flames turned themselves down to minimum and he picked up the abandoned bottle of wine. Rose had to have glasses somewhere; she was unsociable at times and couldn't exactly entertain crowds in her tiny flat but they couldn't just drink tea all the time.

It turns out, he was wrong. The only thing close to wine glasses were the two tumblers at the back of the cupboard, translucent with goodness knew how many months of dust. He chewed his lip and took three of the nicest mugs he could find, sloshing the wine into them and levitating them gently towards the sofa. He made one bash Rose's head heavily enough to get her attention but not so much that she'd deem there to be a need for revenge, and the other floated just shy of Ella's shoulder so that when she turned, she didn't knock it over. They lifted their cups in salutation and cradled them in their hands.

When he served the meal, the three of them crowded around Rose's dining table, James having to eat his from a plate suspended in mid-air by what he hoped was strong magic. Their conversation was light, filled with compliments on the cooking and talk of things they all had in common. When Ella had tried to engage James in conversation about his time in Thailand, Rose had swept in with more wine and a question about her drinking habits. It had been barely noticeable but the distraction seemed to work, nonetheless.

It wasn't until the clock struck eleven and Rose's head slumped back against the sofa that Ella stood up to leave. Their conversation had been quiet since the meal. It had been more focused on the blonde's work and the news – of which James had nothing to offer – and he had played with his empty mug and smiled along when either of them looked to him.

"It was lovely," Ella said as he held open the door. He made a note to fix the hinges over the weekend. "My place next time?" He smiled and nodded his answer. He felt words might ruin it. "You can tell me about Thailand," she said, drooping her coat over her shoulders and smiling up at him. "I think someone was a bit jealous."

James laughed awkwardly and shook his head. "It's boring, honestly."

"Well, I want to hear it," she said, and he conceded with a tilt of his head. Rose shuffled on the sofa and he looked over his shoulder. "Night." She leant up, right to the tip of her toes to lean and press a kiss to his cheek. He felt his face flame up – yet another of the traits he'd not wanted to inherit from either of his parents – and when she disappeared and he thought it safe to shut the door, Rose gave a soft whistle.

"Someone's got a crush," she said. He turned around, Banishing all the plates into the kitchen and didn't say another word. It wasn't worth denying it. Everything in front of him was practically lit up pink from his cheeks and even if he'd tried, he couldn't turn his smile upside down.

He didn't feel guilt. He didn't lust after her. She was Ella, Rose's neighbour, and he was Rose's lodger. She was nice to him – a rare quality in his life, that was undeniable – and she made him smile. It was simple, it was easy, and for now it was enough.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen: Stage Two  
**

It took James two weeks after he started work again to begin with complaints. For the most part, Rose ignored them. Graham Boot was a decent bloke and he definitely didn't deserve James's insults. She thought he was bloody lucky to have a job at all let alone have the cheek to complain about it. Regardless, she let him go on. It was best he aired his worries to her rather than to his boss's face. The last thing she needed was him getting sacked.

She sat down on the sofa and stared despairingly at the coffee table. Putting her biscuit plate down on the cushion beside her, she piled up all the sheets of paper James had strewn across it and pulled them onto her lap. Housing ads; Muggle and not from all over the country. He had been searching for two days and already had amassed a shortlist stretching beyond the realms of what she thought possible. Each ad had a list of pros and cons next to it: kitchen small, no fireplace, creepy old lady next door. She had to give him credit where it was due, he was at least taking it somewhat seriously.

She took a sip of her coffee and turned each page slowly. He'd pinned a gold star to the top of his very favourites and set them to glow, she presumed out of boredom or experimentation. Her eye was caught by a flat in Manchester. It was big. It was airy. It was already connected to the Floo network and there was something about it that screamed James. She smiled. He'd put a number one through the star, like a tattoo. He was actually doing it. He was actually moving towards significant change.

He fell out of the fireplace not two minutes later, looking as though he'd had his soul consumed by the pile of parchment in his hand. He dumped them unceremoniously on the floor and tripped into the armchair pathetically. Rose gave an amused smile. "Good day?"

He turned his head, his cheek pressed firmly against the seat and his mouth lolling open. He didn't need to say the words; 'fuck you' was written all over his face. She tidied up the paper in her grip and put them inside the coffee chest. She offered him a biscuit which made him sit a little straighter and he shoved it into his mouth with all the politeness of a hungry Crup.

"There's a letter for you," she said, pointing over her shoulder to the dining table. He pulled his wand out of his pocket and Summoned it lazily. She could hear her mother's voice in her head as she watched him: _magic will make you lazy, Rose_. She didn't say anything. It was amongst her very worst nightmares to end up like her mum. He tore it open slowly and lethargically; Rose almost felt sorry for him but the way he discarded the envelope on the floor as though the carpet was a rubbish tip made her change her mind quickly. His eyes skimmed the letter and he sat up straighter. He read it a second time, nodding as his grin grew wider and he flapped the paper at her.

"I got the flat," he said and she frowned, grabbing the note from him and skimming it herself. He wasn't wrong. The flat in Manchester was his, providing he could give in the deposit before Tuesday morning. He leapt to his feet and paced to the kitchen. She turned, hauling her feet up to the seat and he gave a low laugh, that chuckle that people made when reality and relief hit them full force. She thought for a moment that he was going to dance but he refrained, slowly clapping his hands together under his chin in what she took as him trying to make a decision and then watched him dig them into his pockets. He turned, swinging his body from the door to the kitchen and then repeating the move. He said nothing before diving out of the front door and hurtling down the steps.

Rose smiled. She wondered how long it'd take.

-::-

Ella thought James Potter was a very strange man, by her standards at least. It was funny how she knew so much of him and yet she was sure he couldn't tell her what her surname was. It didn't matter though. Being around him, she knew so much more than the facts on paper and yet sometimes, she felt she knew nothing at all. He had carefully avoided telling her anything about his Thailand trip. He'd always managed to skirt the answer to the question she most desired to pose because now, after three attempts at broaching the subject, she thought there was something deeper.

The thing was, she trusted him. She had no reason to but she did, yet her line of work didn't often lend itself to reciprocation of that trust, of the loyalty she felt towards him for no reason other than the fact he seemed to have very little else. The ceiling was thin, the house old. She heard him there, all the time that he wasn't working, and when he wasn't upstairs, he was with her. They spoke. As he accustomed himself to life back in Britain – everyone knew he'd been away, after all – he learned more about what had happened in his absence. She thought it strange that he'd not kept up to date with the goings on. The Prophet sold internationally every day, with weekly recaps in the Saturday edition. She had subscribed to it herself when she was sent to Egypt to do an article on what the sand of the Northern Sahara could do for your skin – the answer was nothing but the article had listed seventeen different positives. It was amazing what a bit of imagination could do to get a decent salary.

Regardless, he was well aware now of every single big story of the past three years. She gave him her used copies of the Prophet to peruse when he so wished and he would return with opinions on the new centaur habitation laws and the disadvantages to the new security team at Azkaban. He read her articles through now, not Rose. He sparked debate. He made her think in ways that his cousin always had before but there was something different when he did it. He spoke more passionately. He spoke from his heart not his mind. It was Rose's flaw. She was logic. James was soul.

Perhaps that was why she felt a wave of disappointment as he stood on her threshold and said with a grin wider than the Thames, "I got the flat." She had hugged him, of course. She had pressed a gentle kiss to his cheek before saying how happy she was but she felt a thudding in her chest. There was going to be no more weekend coffee or evening debates or running down the stairs just so he could tell her the stupidest thing. She was reading too much into it, she knew that. It was just what she was like. She imagined things in places that they weren't and ignored those that did in fact exist.

"Are you coming in?" she offered, holding the door back and gesturing inside. Deadline day had just passed and the place was once again immaculate. He cast a glance upstairs and then shrugged.

"Not doing much else." He wiped his shoes on the mat and then slipped them off, leaving them in the hallway. It was only the three of them in the building; they were unlikely to get nicked. He sat down without invitation and she set the water to boil. As she put the tea in the mugs and fetched the milk, she glanced back across her shoulder. He was flicking through the paper. He seemed relaxed, calm, and he was alone. This was more than a perfect moment. She was going to find out what had happened.

"When do you move?" she asked, setting down their mugs and sitting next to him on the settee. He took his cup gratefully and took a sip, wincing as he burnt his lip. Every time.

"I don't know," he said. "They want the deposit quickly. It's a popular location and all that so as soon as that's in, I reckon I can pick a date and go."

She nodded slowly, stirring her tea and sipping carefully. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see his leg jiggling. "Won't you miss London?"

"Nah," he said and he didn't even hesitate. She winced behind her mug. "Never liked the place much." He took another big gulp of the drink and wiped his hand back across his mouth. "I'll probably get dragged back loads though," he said quickly. "Rose'll want to keep an eye on me."

There it was. The key was in the lock and all she had to do now was turn it slowly, teasing it until the information seeped through, click by click. She'd dug enough dirt on the so-called celebrities before. She could do it now, with someone who trusted her.

"I never understood why you live with her," she said, leaning back and twisting her body towards him. He leant his head back and shook his head dismissively. "I don't mean that in a bad way," she added. "I like Rose. It's just small, you know? It doesn't make much sense."

He cast a look across at her, eyes narrowing a little. He sipped at his drink again and let it rest against the back of the sofa, his free hand tucked behind his head. He'd pushed the sleeves of his robes up and she followed the line of his arm swiftly before meeting his eyes.

"Don't you trust me?"

At that, he straightened up and his eyes widened. It was a question that she'd found always got the attention of anyone. He twisted back so he was looking at her properly, pulling his legs further onto the sofa and he sighed.

"Rose'll kill me," he said but she tilted her head and he took a soft breath.

The story could have gone on for hours but he managed to make it into a short summary. It spun nobody in a bad light, she'd noticed that. There was no partiality. He didn't blame himself but nor did he blame his family. Somewhere within her, there was an itch. There was a story unfolding before her eyes, something that could make her. Her career at the magazine was founded on lies but here was something that she could exaggerate into a hit.

But then he said four words and any fleeting thought dissipated in a heartbeat.

"I've got to change."

He made eye contact with her for the first time and she sighed, putting down her mug and moving closer to him, running a hand softly down his arm. He smiled but it was weak. The strength came in his eyes, bold and defiant. He went to say something else but looked away instead, over to the kitchen, the door, the floor, anywhere but her.

"I thought you already had?" He nodded slowly in agreement.

"But I need to convince them of that." He leant away and put his mug down on the floor too. She barely noticed her hand was still on his arm but he didn't shrug it off and she had little wish to move it. "A job, a flat, something stable." The words that came next she knew were hard for him to say from the way he teased his lips around them, unfamiliar and new. "I need to grow up."

"Can you do that on your own?" It sounded condescending and patronising but he didn't seem to take offence. He glanced down to her hand and moved his arm so that it fell limply against his thigh. As she went to withdraw it, blushing, he caught it in his and wound his fingers through hers gently.

"I don't know," he said, twisting their joined hands in all sorts of ways, a nervous habit, perhaps. She caught his eye again and this time he didn't look away. He shifted in his position, leaning closer and it was only when his lips were millimetres from hers that she reacted.

Her first thought on contact was that it was awkward. His weight was unbalanced and she felt like she was going to fall off the seat. With one hand indisposed, she steadied herself with the other which made the entire thing feel amateurish and like two inexperienced teenagers forced together, impersonal and bland.

She drew back and he winced. The feeling, it seemed, was mutual. Releasing his hand, Ella sat upright again, glancing awkwardly to him. He was running his hands down his thighs – she'd tried to ignore the fact that the one she'd held had been a little sticky – and looking off to the side of the room. She laughed.

"What?" he asked as she found herself unable to stop. He wiped his hand back across his mouth in case there was lipstick on them, she supposed, and shook his head so that his hair fell in a different mess. "What is it?" She laughed louder and shrugged with a grin. She couldn't form words, waving a hand dismissively between the two of them. She didn't know whether he was laughing at her or with her but he soon started too and it was only as they calmed down a little that they could find words.

"Come here," she said, moving so she was next to him this time and gently kissed him.

It was better. It was so much better than the tentative half-lunging first attempt had been. One of her hands cupped his cheek, one of his slid around her waist and at some point, he'd pulled her onto his lap but neither remembered when or how it had happened. There was no urgency to it. She thought perhaps it was the respect. He'd spoken of other girls. He'd refused to give a number, though she assumed it was a lot, but this was different. She didn't feel seduced. She didn't feel this was leading to nothing.

He pulled away first this time and she exhaled deeply, her hair falling across her eyes and his arms tightening around her waist. For a moment, he said nothing but then the question she had posed earlier must have been playing on his mind because before he pulled her closer for another kiss, he whispered, "I don't want to do it alone," and even if she'd wanted to escape him, after that, she knew she never would.


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen: Stage Three  
**

"Well," Ella said, looking around the living room of the flat James was to start calling home, "it's certainly spacious." He might have smiled if the strain in her voice hadn't lifted it up into a register above that of her normal tone. The place was empty. He still felt a pull towards it, a call of home, but in the middle of the converted warehouse, he could see the beams and the big windows and almost hear the thrum of the old looms reverberating off the high ceiling. It was metallic and ugly. It was just a room.

But it was a room that completed the final stage of those three points that defined in his head the term adulthood. "It does the job," he said, turning around to where Rose was fiddling about in the kitchen. Ella glanced to the clock. "Do you need to get off?" She nodded and picked up her bag. She'd stopped off in her lunch break but only to see the finished product. He had no doubt that she was disappointed. With a fleeting kiss for James and a wave to Rose, she left.

He started pacing the flat in a way that Rose's had never allowed him to without looking ridiculous. The little furniture he'd acquired from a Muggle second-hand shop near Rose's place didn't really match the modern day young adult look he'd been hoping for. The two armchairs were straight backed and threadbare, the pattern floral and dirtied. The dining table was mahogany, one of the legs held together with sticky tape. In the kitchen, only half of the cupboards were full, the pots and pans dulled and scratched with age.

"James?" He turned and looked to Rose, leaning against the end of the kitchen worktop, her arms crossed across her chest. "Are you screwing her over?"

It took him a second to react. On first discovery, Rose had heaved a sigh of relief at his budding relationship with her neighbour. She'd said that it was about time Ella found someone and that she'd do him good. She wasn't wrong. He wasn't sure what had sparked this thought in her but from the way she had voiced it, her tone and her phrasing, he presumed she'd been thinking of it for a while.

"No," he said, blankly. "Of course I'm not."

"Had it crossed your mind?"

She uncrossed her arms, slipping her fingers through the belt loops of her jeans and walking towards one of the wide windows. The thin glass and exposed brick gave a draught and she perched on the old-fashioned Muggle radiator, painted a heavy onyx, looking out to the street below. Life going on.

"Yes."

A girl to flaunt. Stability. Proof of change. If he'd thought it once, he'd thought it a thousand times but there was no way he'd do it. Rose gave a low laugh and he moved towards her, leaning against the wall a little further up and looking down below them too.

"But if you hurt her, she'd plaster the truth across the front page of Witch Weekly and you'd be back to square one," she said, her tone not biting but solemn. "I thought you'd changed."

"I have," he said without any moment's hesitation that time. Rose looked up at him. She stood up straight and for the first time, James felt how impressive her height really was. In her work heels, she was towering, emphatic and her eyes burned a bright blue.

"Of course that crossed my mind," he continued when she didn't say anything. "How could it not? She's a journalist." He took a moment's pause. "I care about her, okay? Yes, I thought once or twice that I could use her to convince everyone I've changed but that's not the reason that I'm seeing her." He took another break. Rose had relaxed now, leaning back against the radiator again. "I like her a lot."

"And she likes you," she said, glancing up to him. "I don't want to see either of you getting hurt unnecessarily." She glanced to her watch. "Fancy a cuppa?"

"If you're making," he said but it hadn't been worth him voicing his view. She was already crossing the room at 'if'. He followed and watched her flicking her wand in all the necessary directions. "You know I'm not going to pretend I'm single, though?"

"What do you mean?" she said absently, opening up cupboards as she tried to remember where she'd put the teabags she'd given as a housewarming gift. He leant his hands against the worktop and handed her the box from beside him.

"I didn't get with her for that but it doesn't mean I'm not going to ask her to support me."

"And you think she won't think it's strange?" Rose asked as she took the water off the boil and poured it into the two mugs. He knew she was trying to keep herself from scolding him, telling him she didn't believe him. The words had been floating in his head since the conversation had begun and forcing them out was difficult but worth it.

"If she trusts me as much as I trust her, then no."

The brunette placed his tea on the worktop in front of him. She covered his hand with hers and he glanced up. She was smiling like she actually meant it.

"I've been waiting for you to say something like that."

The words took a second to sink in, in which Rose picked up her own mug and leant back against the worktop, waiting for the reaction.

"I've done it?" he said and though 'it' was never made explicit, it said so much. She lowered her cup from her lips and nodded.

It. The change. The marked improvement in everything about him. The understanding. The self-belief becoming more widespread. He was sure she'd never doubted him, not really. It had been eleven years since they'd turned from the best friends back to merely cousins but still she knew how to play him, how to make him see it all. He put his mug down and tentatively, far more tentatively than he wanted to, opened his arms. She stared just for a second before putting hers down and accepting the hug.

"Thank you," he said, the words forming around his laugh. She gave him a quick squeeze and then stepped back, taking her mug and smiling up over to him.

He tried to take a sip of his drink but his hands were shaking and he felt his heart practically beating out of his chest in pride. He wouldn't let it eat him up, though. He was sure of that. He was going to remain calm and collected and adult. He wasn't going to let it make him more confident. He'd fully convinced Rose but that was the easy part. He had seven cousins, five uncles, four aunts, two siblings and two parents yet to work on. It would take a long time for them to restore their confidence to the level which Rose now had in him but that was okay.

The thought hit him like a train hurtling towards an unfathomable end. The rickety throb of the one he'd taken to come back shook through him. He had sat there, in that carriage with everything he had held in one small box. It was gone now, and he still felt a burning fury at his parents' pettiness but he wouldn't let it overpower him. It was in the past; a few clothes, a couple of books, things he didn't need anymore. Things didn't matter. It was all replaceable.

He would test the waters before diving in. He turned to Rose, who was staring at him most amusedly as his thoughts bubbled away, and grinned.

"Housewarming party."

-::-

In theory, it had been a good idea. None of them had really expected much of an attendance but regardless, Rose, James and Ella dressed themselves up, bought several crates of alcohol and even found a wireless station that didn't only play music from the 90s, amplifying it so it sang through the room. It didn't stop the fact that each second that passed crushed all their hopes a little tighter. The invitations had stated half past seven and now as the clock slipped closer to half eight, they had stopped messing around with the volume of the music and pretending that they liked the nibbles. Rose held her wine glass tightly, taking minute sips every time she felt the urge to speak, and Ella cradled hers in the hand that wasn't softly caressing James's. He kept flicking his eyes towards the clock and then stonily to the fireplace.

It was slightly more of a shock, therefore, when Rose's glass crashed to the ground and splintered as a body came flying out of the fire and just about stopped itself falling by bracing itself on one of the armchairs. "Sorry," Fred said, standing up and dusting himself off. "Nearly missed the grate." He looked around, half expecting more than just the three of them to be sat there and raised his eyebrows. "Oh."

"Mm," Rose said, holding her hand out for his cloak. He shrugged it off and sat down on the armchair he'd nearly fallen on. "What's your excuse?"

"Work," he said. "Kids starting back at school soon, all sorts of squabbling over which owl they want and my boss trying to tell them that toads are back in fashion." Ella raised an eyebrow and he shook his head. "They're not. Not even in the slightest but we ended up with a shitload by accident and we can't shift them."

"Sell them to the Apothecary," Rose muttered, handing her cousin a can of something from the stack on the table. "They'll find a use for them." He didn't voice his opinion and James thought that was probably wise. Rose wasn't an animal person. It had caused one too many arguments before and at least Fred recognised that he had to at least try to be civil for now, until enough time lapsed that he could leave without it being awkward.

"Do you know if anyone else will come?" Ella said after an overly long silence passed between them. Fred took a sip from his can and shrugged.

"Rox said she'd see how she was fixed for time. Not spoken to the others for ages," he said. He tapped his fingers against the can. "Nice place." It sounded genuine and James relaxed. Considering the state he'd been in last time Fred saw him, and now he thought of it the time before that too, he thought it was good enough that he'd even turned up let alone was being civil.

"I need to make it a bit more me but it'll do," he said, trying to make himself sound more mature than he felt at that moment. His mind flickered to his seventh birthday party when he sat with his parents waiting for half an hour for everyone to arrive and yet they never did. His mum had told him to be brave. What would it have looked like if everyone arrived and they saw him crying? It had just been a Floo problem at their end and when people eventually started arriving, via brooms and Portkeys and Apparition, his mum had kissed him and told him he was a good boy. That was the last time he recalled having to hide something away, hide the upset last time and the nerves now.

The conversation came more easily as time went on. Fred, it turned out, was still with the girlfriend he'd been with when James had left. He was still saving to be able to afford the course costs for veterinarian work and reckoned he'd only have another year before he could manage it. He questioned James on work and only after that did he notice Ella's hand in his cousin's. "You kept that one quiet," Fred said, nodding towards the linked hands.

"Early days," James said, glancing over to Ella who was faintly blushing. Fred nodded slowly and put his can down.

"You know, credit where it's due, I'm impressed," he said and Ella took that as a cue to join Rose with a copy of the Prophet. Fred leant forward and James shuffled up the sofa. "Seriously, mate, wouldn't have put it past you to disappear again and never come back."

He tried to ignore the swell through his body at his cousin's words. Fred had grown up and now, now James wasn't that interested in competing against him, in comparing himself. Surely that was a sign above everything that it was going to work out? That he too had begun to act the age he was.

"Reckon the others will see it like that?" James asked, rolling his drink between his hands but Fred didn't have time to answer. Another body spat itself out of the fireplace and a second followed before anyone had time to identify the first. James's soft exhalation was barely audible as he took in Lucy and Roxanne, shaking the dust off their dresses. Awkwardly, James stood to his feet and dug his free hand into his pocket for lack of anything else to do with it.

"Well, I'm not angry with you," Roxanne said in answer to a question that nobody had even thought of posing. "I fucking hate Dominique." Lucy hit her and she started. "Well, it's true. You brought a bit of life to the thing."

"Thanks," James said slowly. Lucy didn't explain herself. She smiled when Ella passed her a glass of wine and sipped politely. It was Lucy's way. The conversation was livelier though, even with only six people in the room. There was a jokiness to Roxanne that he'd never noticed before and Ella, it turned out, was working under Lucy's mum's section of the magazine. Fred told Rose how Owen had been and she in return pretended she didn't care less. When the music became slower, older, they turned it off and still the conversation bubbled.

It was two o'clock when they deemed that they ought to leave. Fred clapped James on the shoulder. Roxanne hugged him. Rose kissed his cheek. Lucy paused before her hug. "You know, I think Molly would be a good bet," she said, brushing her hair out of her eyes and referencing the last conversation they'd had, debating who the 'problem' relatives would be. "She had the baby. A little girl, Megan. It'd be a great talking point." She gave him a smile with a row of crooked white teeth and hugged him tightly. "It was lovely to see you."

She held up a hand in goodbye and followed the others into the fireplace, disappearing from sight and leaving only James and Ella behind. He sat down heavily on the sofa and gave a short laugh.

"That went well," he said as she took the plate of crisps off the cushion next to him and sat down.

"You sound surprised."

"Aren't you?" he asked, twisting and leaning his head against the back of the seat. She shrugged and he nodded for her to elaborate.

"I think you underestimate your family," she said. "From the sounds of things, they all just followed suit."

He knew it was true. Rose had said it before. She hadn't really ever hated him for leaving. She thought he was a bastard, greedy and selfish, but she always knew she'd been taking their word against his. There were two sides of every story and she had wanted to reserve judgement until she could hear both. Then two and a half years had elapsed and what had begun as reservation soon became concordance with the expectations that the others had from her. She had taken their feelings, their words on board and let them muddle with her own memories, her own beliefs.

"Yeah," he said. Fred was a good man. He always had been and Roxanne was always willing to be on the side that would prove most interesting in a battle. Lucy had surprised him. She was the good one; she liked rules and structure and obedience. She wasn't stuffy but she was wary of people who she didn't trust and if he was being honest, he wouldn't have put himself very high on the list of people she considered herself friendly with. He thought he'd quite scared her in their youth; loud, brash, cruel compared to her quiet timidity. Evidently, he was a bad judge of character.

"What next, then?" she asked, shuffling closer to him. He slipped his arm around her and kissed the top of her head.

"Molly," he said, thinking on Lucy's goodbye to him. "I think if I win her, I've got Victoire and if I get her, I get Teddy."

It was a domino effect from there. Victoire would pull on her family and Teddy on the Potters. Word of mouth, that was all that was needed. Neither of them said anything else. There was a positivity hanging in the air; perhaps it was the alcohol or perhaps it was the fact James had seen more people than just Ella, Rose and his grandmother that had created the warmth in the early morning atmosphere, he couldn't tell. There was, however, the prospect of more in the morning so with one last lingering kiss, they both closed their eyes and let the echo of six voices sing them to sleep.


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen: Trying Again  
**

"I really think you should come with me first," Rose said to James as he flicked through a pile of paperwork on his desk. She had ventured into his office on her way back from a meeting to continue the argument they'd been having for the past three days.

He had been adamant that his next move would be to work on Molly but Rose was sceptical. It wasn't that she didn't like Molly, though she did find her insufferably high and mighty at times, but that by comparison, she was irrelevant. She was a relative he barely saw. Her parents, on the other hand, had been there almost constantly in his youth. They had influence. Her father could be irrational at times but her mother was the opposite. She could see things in people, changes. It was her, after all, that had given Scorpius Malfoy's dad a promotion when everyone else on the committee had turned their noses up. She would see the shift in James's disposition. It was the only sensible way to do things.

"Will it shut you up?" he said, not lifting his eyes and bending down behind his desk to open a drawer. She smiled. She knew her persistence would annoy him enough eventually to make him give in. They were both stubborn but his patience was thinner; it was normally a good recipe for winning an argument.

"Yes," she replied. "Come to mine tonight, five to seven, and we can go together."

"Dinner?" he said, the time striking him, and she nodded. "You didn't say we were going to go for dinner."

"I thought you'd want to get it over with quickly," she said. "Get it done today and tomorrow you can go to Molly and do your begging there, and the only time Mum and Dad are going to be free to talk tonight is at dinner."

He took a moment to digest her logic but then he dropped his quill, slumped in his chair and sighed. "Fine," he said, though sounded quite the opposite. "Fine, I'll be there."

She flashed him a large grin, grabbed one of the sweets off the dish on his desk and left. Now all she had to do was find a way to stop her dad and brother from ripping James's head off when he landed in their living room uninvited.

"You look fine," Ella insisted as James stood in front of the mirror in his bedroom, yanking at his collar. On the bed was a pile of clothes that he'd discarded: robes were too formal, a t-shirt too casual, the blue top didn't go with the trousers and the orange shirt had a hole in it. He made a mental note to stop giving Beryl owl treats for the next week in return.

"I don't feel it," he replied, turning around and whipping his wand so violently that the clothes didn't fold themselves but leapt up in the air and landed on the floor with a gentle thud. "Rose has it in for me. She wants me to die."

"Stop being so bloody melodramatic," Ella warned, picking up her own wand and sending the clothes neatly back inside the wardrobe. She shut the doors softly and tucked her wand into her pocket. "It's going to be fine."

"Not if Uncle Ron tries to throw me back in the fire," he said and she whacked him on the arm.

"Don't be so rude and act your age," she said. At that, he straightened up, looking down at her and twisting his lips into an unimpressed pout. She knew the right words to say to get him to man up. In a way, he quite regretted telling her everything. "From the sounds of things, they were more tolerant than your parents."

He couldn't deny that either. Ron and Hermione had, at least, taken him in when he'd arrived. Hugo had reacted like the overprotective prat that he'd always been and so had his father but Aunt Hermione was sensible. He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind in a voice that sounded like Rose, that she would see him for what he had become and would come to be, not what was once.

"Okay, fine," he said eventually, his voice mock-huffy and he wrapped his hand around his neck awkwardly. "Will I do, then?"

"I wouldn't be ashamed of you," she said, teetering up on her heels and pecking him on the lips. "You're going to be late if you don't get going." He glanced to his watch and exhaled deeply. "Good luck."

She gave him a gentle push towards the door and he turned, feeling perhaps a little bit pathetic, to say, "Will you be here when I get back?" She nodded and he felt a little bit better. "Sure you don't want to come too?"

She didn't say anything but her look said 'just go' and with a grin that was far happier than he felt about the entire thing, he disappeared out of the door. He only hesitated for a moment before throwing the Floo powder in the grate, stepping in and calling out Rose's home. He landed and almost instantly, she was dragging him out of the door. "Hi," he said as she flipped the lights off and slammed the door. She practically threw him down the stairs and she grabbed hold of his wrist when they reached their Apparition point.

"I'm not having you wander off," she said by way of explanation when he tried to tug himself away. He didn't argue and when they landed, he pulled his arm away.

"I'm not going to leg it," he assured her when she looked at him sceptically. "Promise." She took that slightly more convincingly and she hurried off first, down towards her childhood home. "Remind me why we didn't Floo?" He wasn't keen on Apparition when making surprise visits. He had a fear of a door being slammed in his face from the many times Victoire had done it to him in the past and if the wrong person opened it, he could feel the prospect of a broken nose in his bones. Rose didn't turn around but called her reply out for all the world to hear.

"Mum's more likely to answer the door," she said, stopping when she reached the gate. James upped his pace and joined her, staring up at the house which now felt huge, overpowering. "Unless you want the big argument in the living room, that is?"

"No," James said as she pushed open the gate and stepped through. He followed cautiously. He'd not paid a great deal of attention to the house last time. They'd painted it a soft cream over the brilliant white of his youth. The flowerbeds were starting to weep now and the grass was in need of a mow. Rose knocked on the door, blue now rather than red, and he exhaled heavily, standing just out of view.

His cousin was right. The door opened and his aunt's voice wafted out. "Why on earth didn't you Floo?" She leant forward to hug her daughter and caught sight of him, stepping into her eye line. "Oh." Her gaze didn't linger on him long but she turned to Rose and shook her head. "Do you think this is a good idea?

"I don't think it's a bad one," Rose replied. The lack of real surprise gave away to James the fact that Rose had probably already confided in her mother that she was in contact with him. "Just one meal."

"You told us you were bringing a friend," Hermione said, looking every few seconds to her nephew who had dug his hands into his pockets and was staring sheepishly at the floor. Rose didn't say anything but he took the prolonged silence to mean they were exchanging some kinds of meaningful looks to save making him feel any more awkward. "Okay. Your brother's not here."

It was meant to be a confidence boost for him, James thought, but now he felt a pull of dread in his stomach. He could just run. The adults were always going to be harder to convince. He could work on the cousins and wait for the message to pass through to their parents. Rose stepped over the threshold and looked at him in a way that said he had no choice. If her father didn't rip him to shreds for going in, she most definitely would if he left.

He stepped over the threshold and his aunt shut the door. He shrugged his jacket off and slipped his shoes into the rack by the door. Hermione disappeared into the kitchen and Rose poked her head around the sitting room door. James could hear Ron standing up and making his way towards his daughter as she crossed the room to him and he waited for a cue but nothing came. Feeling out of place, he glanced to the front door but that voice in his head came back, niggling and annoying and as much as he wanted to deny it, it was right: he was a Gryffindor. He was brave. He stepped into the living room and waited for the tirade.

It never came.

It took Ron a moment or two to even register who was in his sitting room. He looked from Rose to James and then sat down. When he spoke, his voice was calm. "This is a surprise."

"Well," James began but his throat was dry and the words seemed petty and bland in his head. He stopped and looked to Rose but she kept her mouth shut for what he thought might have been the first time in a long while. He cursed her inwardly. Ron didn't look up from his newspaper and nor did he say another word. James caught Rose's eye and she shrugged. Without saying anything else, he left the room.

The food was cooking away without any aid from his aunt, who was leaning against the worktop and staring out across the back garden. At the sound of footsteps, she looked around and smiled. "Rose is a good girl," she said, "but she's not a miracle worker."

The words were slow and measured, her tone solemn. She eyed him up and down. His skin was pale again, his freckles fading now he was back under the eye of an English summer not the burning heat of South Africa. He felt like he was being examined but if there was anyone who knew a book couldn't be judged solely by its cover, it was her.

"Do you think I needed a miracle?" he asked, walking slowly towards her and glancing across the garden too. He didn't look down to her but he felt the turn of her head towards him.

"No," she said. "I think you needed someone to knock some sense into you." He gave a low laugh and felt her moving away, a spoon stirring one of the pans. He'd always had a soft spot for Aunt Hermione, above all the others. There was an understanding in her that he thought might come from the brain that everyone admired her for having; an ability to look past the emotional for the rational and turn it on its head as well. "Rose said you've changed."

"Not my place to say," he said. If there was one thing he'd learned, it was that. People judged by themselves. They wouldn't take his thoughts on himself as anything near gospel. He could tell as many people as he liked that he had changed and yet he knew that none of them would believe it until they themselves had seen it. Evidently his aunt agreed. She gave a slow nod and turned off the heat on one of the pans. "Will Uncle Ron come round?"

"Why are you asking about him?" she asked slowly. 'Why not me?' It was clear in her words, no matter how lightly she said them. He took a moment to formulate the words properly. He didn't need to take ten steps back.

"Because I think you trust your daughter more than you distrust me," he said. She smiled, crossing her arms over her chest and giving a small nod to encourage him to go on. He still spoke hesitantly, watching every movement she made with the utmost scrutiny. It would give away the tiniest of details into her point of view. "And Uncle Ron, he –" There was an arrogance in his next words as they played out in his head. It was unavoidable and so he spoke heavily, slowly, laying his words down with severity rather than the light asides he'd always found so comfortable in doing. "I think he holds a grudge too long."

He hadn't expected it but Hermione gave a small laugh and turned around from the sink where she was draining off the vegetables. "You're probably right," she said, putting the pan down and crossing her arms over her chest. "I think it'll take time to get back to how things where," she said, "but you probably all know that." He nodded hurriedly. He wasn't a fool. He wasn't expecting open arms and kisses. He was only after acceptance that he knew would lead a slow, steady growth of belief in him over time. "Go on, go and sit down." She put her hand gently on his and jerked her head towards the door to the dining room. He nodded, with a small smile, and did as he was told.

The conversation over the meal got gradually easier. James would have sworn he even saw his uncle smile on one or two occasions but he didn't take it too personally. It could merely have been a trick of the light. He refused to lift his hopes in the places they were only just being born. They Flooed back at ten o'clock, each to their own homes. Ella was reading on his bed when James got back and she put it down expectantly. He lingered by the door for a moment before smiling and nodding.

"I think I've got them."

-::-

Ron crept silently as he could into his bedroom. His wife had not long gone to bed but she had finished her nightly reading already, buried underneath the covers. Sliding in next to her, he stared up at the ceiling. He felt betrayal coursing through him. His best friend and his sister; he owed them more than he could quite believe and he had been sure of his disdain for their son stretching onwards.

But he understood. There were nights, after he and Hermione had argued or Harry had sent him off on a job that he'd not wanted to do, when he still thought on the way he had abandoned them at the time they needed him most. Jealousy. Anger. Fear. He had had his reasons and James must have had his. He had never complained, not even once, about being Harry Potter's son. His own children sometimes mentioned how they received attention they didn't want. Lily had made a point of it countless times over dinner, Al agreeing mutedly. James, though, had always kept his silence. Perhaps because he was oldest, he thought he had to pretend it didn't matter? Maybe he'd loved it and come to feel the opposite, trapped in expectations he thought were above him. He was, after all, still only young. He was still making mistakes.

"You want to forgive him." Hermione's mumble was weary and quiet, muffled by the duvet, but he still heard it in the silence of their home. She rolled over and looked up through bleary eyes. Ron glanced down and shrugged. "You saw it."

"Saw what?" he asked as she shuffled towards him and nudged his arm with her head. He slipped it around her and she placed one hand gently on his chest. He asked but he knew the answer. James had changed. He was sorry. He wanted to move forward. "Reckon he'll get Harry and Ginny on side?"

"Yes." His wife's reply was without hesitation. "I don't doubt that at all."

Ron nodded, pressing a kiss against her forehead and closing his eyes. If he was being perfectly honest, nor did he.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen: Second Impressions  
**

There was something he found terribly unnerving about babies. He wasn't sure exactly what but as he stared down at the latest addition to the ever-expanding Weasley family nestled in Ella's arms, he thought it might have been the idea that their entire lives were yet to be determined, that they didn't even understand the term 'choice' let alone have to make one. After the relatively successful trip to his godparents, he had decided that Molly would be a piece of cake. With Ella on his arm, tempted by meeting her boss's other daughter, he had knocked firmly on their door in a way that barely even gave away the fact that his hand was trembling.

Molly hadn't seemed especially surprised or eager to see him but that would never have been anything new. She'd let him in and offered them tea, not so much as raising the question about why he'd rolled up on her doorstep. Ella enquired after the baby and James politely asked after Imogen; she seemed vaguely impressed that he'd managed to recall her eldest's name. Their conversation was fuelled by stories of what Molly had done, everyone reluctant to ask after James.

"So how long have you two been together?" Molly asked as she took Megan off Ella and settled her down in the Moses basket on the table. The story unfolded and so came about the job and the flat and who he'd convinced around. When Ella went to the bathroom, Molly finally opened a little. "Who do you want me to talk to?" He went to protest but she shook her head. "Come on, we barely used to say two words to each other unless we had to. Is it Vic?"

"It's nobody," he said, and it was a half-truth. She seemed sceptical. "Yes, it'd be nice if you mentioned me but I'm not here just for that." She nodded slowly as though she understood but James was quite sure that she didn't. Now he thought of it, he couldn't think of the other reason except serving himself. The more people he won around, the better: that had been his thought. Now, he was struggling to find a reason and he missed having Ella at his side or Rose to step in.

"I've never had much reason to dislike you," Molly said. "What you did at the wedding was completely insane but I don't think you deserved what you got." She looked up as Ella came back in but carried on. "I think you're turning out to be pretty decent."

At that, she quieted, standing up to find something in one of the cupboards. James looked to Ella who had tilted her head inquisitively. He shook his head and after some hesitant goodbyes, they left. "She was nice," Ella said as they wandered through the streets of the small Yorkshire town that Molly lived in. James nodded. "What did she say when I was gone?"

"Nothing," he said. She didn't believe him but didn't press him either. It was close to truth, he thought. It was nothing that would really help but his most selfish side crept out just far enough to leave the voice ringing in his ears as he Disapparated: it was one more on side.

-::-

Teddy stood in front of one of the fireplaces in St Mungo's, Floo powder in hand. There was a line starting to form and the little old woman directly behind him kept whacking the back of his calves with her briefcase. He sent her a glare and turned back to his thoughts. "Hurry it up, there," came a call from one of the caretakers somewhere in the room and without having truly contemplated what he was doing, threw a handful of the powder in and called out his destination.

James's place was far nicer than he'd anticipated. It was light, airy, a cool breeze creeping in as was typical at the start of September. The furniture didn't quite fit with the place but he assumed that to be the fault of spending money on the rent rather than furnishing. He called out after realising he'd been stood there for two minutes and neither seen nor heard anyone, and there was a scuffling from what he presumed to be the bedroom. The door squeezed open and a blonde girl came flying out first, her cloak cast haphazardly over her and her hair falling out of its bun. "Oh," Teddy said, not sure whether covering his eyes was the polite or rude thing to do. "Er, wrong address?"

"Depends who you're looking for."

How had he ended up in Aberdeen? He had a tendency to mumble but he most certainly hadn't confused Aberdeen with Manchester. "James Potter," he said and she tilted her head towards the bedroom. He went to say something but couldn't find the words and let his mouth shut slowly. "Of course."

There was more shuffling from the second room and James appeared, his hair sticking up in more ways than normal and his face flushed red. "Teddy!"

"I'll come back," the older man said, though there was something in his voice that didn't entirely convince him let alone the other two. Molly had suggested – heavily – that James seemed to have turned things around. Evidently some habits were harder to stop.

"Why?" the blonde said before James could offer a word of protest and she stepped forward. "I've heard a lot about you. I'm Ella." For a moment, Teddy just stared before he caught James flapping a hand at him out of the corner of his eye and it all became clear.

"Oh," he said, rubbing his neck awkwardly. "Right. So you're together?" Ella gave a nod and Teddy smiled. She glanced up to him then over to James and silently, without even asking if anyone wanted anything, disappeared into the kitchen. The sound of running water and china clinking echoed through and Teddy looked across to the boy that had been both the bane and life of his childhood.

There was something different about his walk; that was the first thing he noticed. It had become more of a strut, a swagger, in his school days. He'd walked with his back straight, head high, taller than all his cousins and he had revelled in it. Now, it was more casual. His hands were dug into his pockets, his shoulders hunched and he seemed more at home in nodding Teddy towards the sofa. They sat down and looked everywhere but at the other one.

"Molly's been singing your praises," he said. "Both of them, actually, Molly and Mrs Weasley. They tell me you've shown a bit of a change of heart."

The words were coming out awkwardly and both men seemed a little lost. Everything Teddy thought of sounded stiff and everything James replied with was short and simple. They were speaking but it was pointless. Ella eased between them, holding out their mugs and didn't say anything as she left the flat. "She seems nice," Teddy said, sipping politely. James nodded.

"Rose's neighbour. She's been a huge help."

Another silence swam between them. Teddy put his drink down and leant forwards, looking at James only through the corner of his eye.

"I want to hear the whole story, Jay," he said and James flinched at the name. Teddy had forgotten he'd been the only person who had ever done it; a childhood mistake that had stuck and even though James had always claimed to hate it, Teddy was sure he'd have missed it when it stopped. Something about the way the boy – it still felt strange to call him a man – had moved made him wonder whether he'd forgotten or maybe it was something else, a secret of his missing years. The darker man looked up and nodded. Teddy assumed he'd told it many a time already and the weariness in James's voice was confirmation.

When it was over, he felt blank. He had denied himself the thought of considering himself an older brother for James during the boy's absence and now he felt he wanted to deny it out of shame. His parents were gone; their legacy paled beside Harry's, despite the adoring tales told by his godfather of them. He had started school feeling an obligation to make them proud, to equal what he had now learned he never could. With a wand in hand, he could make the most perfect Potion or Charm things to do anything but faced with a duel, faced with defending himself, he had always failed.

He still didn't know if it was sheer inability or fear of being unable to match his parents' past but he tried not to think on it.

Harry's legacy was still forming. He was leader of one of the best Auror teams there had been in recent history, he was recognised across the world, his face the future of legend. James had led the three of them into battle against it. The first man in was nearly always the first taken out. Where James had failed, Al had triumphed. Lily stumbled on her way but she had had the others to watch out for her. Teddy hadn't been there for James but nor had anyone else impressed themselves upon him. They were all at fault and there was something about the guilt that made him want to turn back time.

But that was impossible so instead, he settled for an apology.

"What for?" James asked, putting his mug down and settling back against the sofa. Teddy tried to explain but James cut him off. "I'm over it."

"You think?" Teddy asked and his host nodded. "Vic'll come round. She doesn't know I'm here but she's been debating it since Molly and your Nanna mentioned you."

"Good," James said, smiling. "How's Rémy?"

Teddy was mildly taken aback by the question but proceeded to discourse on his son's mischievous two years. A baby when James had last clapped eyes on him, the photo in Teddy's wallet showed a brightness to the three-year-old that the older man remembered seeing in James.

"And?" James asked, pointing to the baby that he was sure wasn't the toddler in his youth, unless Victoire had gotten momentarily confused by gender.

"Josie," Teddy said. "She's nineteen months." There was a moment's silence before Teddy spoke again. "You missed one hell of a lot, mate." James nodded with a low sigh. He stretched his arms out in front of him and looked out to the window. The nights were drawing steadily in and it was already nearly dark.

"I don't plan on missing much more," he said. "You should probably get home before she starts worrying."

Teddy nodded, slipping his wallet back into his cloak pocket and standing up. James stood with him and there was a beat before Teddy stepped forward and enveloped him in a hug. "You're a fucking idiot, you know that?" he said, ruffling James's hair as he stepped back. The younger man tried to flatten it back down but it was in vain and he shrugged.

"Might have been told once or twice, yeah."

As Teddy stepped into the fireplace, he just had time to give James a small wave before the familiar feeling of being stuck in the spin cycle of a washing machine swept through him and he found himself back at home, listening to Josie crying and Rémy laughing and Victoire somewhere in between the two. He gave a small chuckle: home, sweet home.

-::-

Molly picked up the last of the eggs from the chicken coop and bustled back to the house. She'd never much liked September. The air was deceptively cold, the rain almost invisible against the grey background. She set the eggs in the rack on the windowsill and turned, pressing her hand to her chest when she saw a figure sat at her kitchen table.

"Oh, dear, you frightened the living daylights out of me," she said as she hurried to give James a hug and a kiss. She stepped back and scrutinised him. "Someone's been feeding you up," she said, tapping his cheek and he grinned. "Is it this Ella I'm hearing so much about?"

"I've not told you about her," James said and Molly smiled back. One by one, her grandchildren had dropped by with stories of James, questions and queries. Rose had kept her up to date every other day to begin with and as the news became less and less frequent, she had taken it as a positive. She was trying not to Floo or Apparate much; her bones weren't quite as strong as they used to be and it took it out of her. James had been so busy with work that their only correspondence had been letters.

"I have my sources," Molly said, tapping her nose and putting the kettle on. "You need some colour in those cheeks though. That dark hair washes you out." James laughed and she knew what he was thinking. She always had to fuss about something or other. She couldn't help it. She was the maternal sort, always had been.

"Thank you," he said, standing up and following her into the proper kitchen. She turned and smiled.

"Whatever for?"

"Everything," he said. "Getting Rose to put me up, singing my praises to everyone, all that."

She took him in. She'd said it a thousand times but he truly was one of the best boys she knew. She was biased, that was true, but before him was a boy who had fallen so far off the tracks that he could barely even see them anymore and who had dragged himself back. She was grateful for Rose's help but at the same time, she never could have helped someone who didn't want to help themselves. James had wanted to change. His story had been heart breaking for her, when Teddy had relayed it last week, the only one to disclose the subject matter of their conversations with James to her. She had felt as much guilt as the rest.

But now she felt slightly more as the sound of gravel crunching outside grew louder. James had alerted her that he would be visiting and she had hoped that she could finally fix everything but as the footsteps grew louder and louder, the shred of doubt she'd started with grew louder. James seemed oblivious to anything and it was only when she handed him his mug and he saw the four others that a penny seemed to click.

He didn't say anything. Molly assumed he didn't know what to say. Instead, he closed his eyes, leant back against the worktop and waited.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter Nineteen**

He thought he ought to feel something greater than the reality. A sense of betrayal, of treachery, but instead he just got a flurry of nerves, simple and uninspiring. His grandmother was doing it out of kindness. She was making the final stitch in the fixing of his very being and for that, he knew he ought to be grateful.

Lily's voice was high, carrying above the muted conversation that the Potters brought with them. Molly placed a gentle hand on James's arm before sweeping to welcome them in, reminding Al to take his shoes off and telling Harry he needed to fatten up. James glanced to the kitchen door. He had once perfected the art of hiding, of concealment but he had no desire to do so; even if he did, burying himself behind the sofa was unlikely to fool one of the world's leading Aurors.

He winced at the tone the voice in his head took. It was cruel, mocking; it was him, the him he'd buried deep inside, still biting, still snapping, still lurking, waiting for the right moment to unleash itself. He sipped at his tea. He wouldn't let that be today.

"Oh." Lily's voice was of what appeared to be true surprise and James turned to face her. She stood strong, tall and lean, in front of him. "Look what the cat dragged in."

He knew his sister well enough to see beyond the mask but it still stung. What had hurt her had hurt him ten times more in the long run. His brother and parents had come to a halt behind Lily and they stared as though they were seeing someone long dead, like their grandfather's ghost had come back to haunt his kitchen.

"Come now," Molly said, squeezing past Albus and sending mugs of tea towards the family with four flicks of her wand. They all hovered in mid-air until Ginny made the first hesitant move and took hers. James noticed her hands clenching so tightly around it that it was making the mug shake. The other three followed suit. "I think it's high time we put this to bed."

She gestured towards the living room and one by one, led by James, the Potters followed. Molly patted the armchair that had once belonged to her husband and he sat down softly, the honour of the place in the room sinking in. Albus sat at his parents' feet, Lily squeezed between them. The only noise was the gentle sipping of the tea. Molly took a quick survey of the room and with a last smile to her grandson, left the room.

Before Lily could get in another poorly formed insult, James cleared his throat. Out of the corner of her eye, Ginny looked. "Why did you burn my stuff?"

"Don't you think you deserve it?" Lily replied quickly but their mother hushed her with one scathing glare. The teenager crossed her arms across her chest and chewed on her lip.

"What do you mean?" Harry asked, sipping his tea softly but not taking his eyes off his son. James exhaled.

"I saw it, the burn mark, my trunk," he said, the memories blurred by vodka shots and pints of unnamed ale. "You hate me that much?" He tried not to look to Lily but held his father's gaze. Harry looked away first and whispered something that James didn't hear but was addressed to Lily and Albus. His siblings stood up, neither making eye contact with anything else, and left.

"What makes you think that your things were in it?" James opened his mouth but the words that were on his tongue didn't answer the question. He thought it over for a moment and then gave a small shrug. "The trunk wasn't yours. We didn't know where it was from and there was some strong magic on it. We thought it best to destroy it."

"All your clothes," his mother's voice was tight and severe, but at least she was talking, "are in your room."

James stared blankly at her before giving a small, "Oh," of comprehension. He'd been so concerned about finding the case that he'd not thought that they might have expected him to return.

"Where've you been?"

He looked up and although her face was dry, there was something of a sob in his mother's voice that made him want to be deafened so that he wouldn't have to face it again. He hadn't so much as tried to contact them. He'd tried what he thought was the easy way out with no thought to his parents' love: that unconditional love that he had never really understood but that had made him come home, eventually.

"I was with Rose," he said but now his words felt hollow. "She's been helping me." Their eyes still weren't crossing paths but James found it easier to talk at the demonstration of some form of weakness by his mother. "I've changed, Mum. I've got my job back, a flat, a girl."

Yes, he still drank and sometimes it was just for the sake of it. Yes, he still smoked but not quite so much as before. Yes, a good pair of legs would capture his attention but only for a second until he thought that what he had with Ella was much better than one night with Jade or Jo or Jess. His argument seemed weak, despite having given it a dozen times already, but this time there seemed to be less need for convincing.

"We never hated you," Harry said, though all three knew that that was true already. "We were angry and hurt and embarrassed." The third word stung. "When you came back, it was a shock and at the wedding, it was –" His father paused as he tried to find the right word, "painful to see you like that."

"We went to the pub the next day," Ginny continued, "but you weren't there. We were going to call a search and then we got your letter saying you were going away again –" Rose; she'd saved him the trouble of facing them before he was ready to prove himself. He owed her more than he could recognise. He nodded as though it had been him all along, and his mother continued. "God, I was angry at you but never for one second –" she trailed off and James saw that now she'd given up pretending that she wasn't going to cry, "_never_ did we stop loving you."

He felt like a child, lost in an adult world that he didn't understand yet, as he stood up and fell at her knees. He had stopped his mother from hugging him like that when he was fifteen. Their greetings had fallen to a simple kiss and a quick squeeze before the train pulled out of the station. One hand rubbed his back softly, the other held the back of his head, drifting through his hair. She was whispering at him but it seemed to be nothing but the strange comfort of nonsensicality.

When he drew back, he stood and let his father give him a tight but firmer hug. "I think I need to speak to them," James said and both his parents nodded. With a smile and an awkward wave, he darted from the room. Lily was sat at the dining table, making two bananas waltz around the centre.

"Hi," he said softly, sitting down carefully in the seat next to her and watched the fruit fall with a resounding thud on the top. She looked away. "Were you listening?" She shook her head gently. "I'm sorry, okay? I needed quick money. I always meant to pay you back."

"It's not about the money," she said and she turned slowly towards him, tucking her feet under her and wringing her hands together on her lap. "You just left. You didn't even _write_."

"I meant to."

"You seem to have meant to do a lot," she said dryly. He gave a small shrug of apology. "I just missed you, that's all." He seemed mildly taken aback before she continued. "Well, it started about the money. I was distraught, of course I was. I can't even remember how long I'd been saving it." He couldn't either; it felt like forever. "But then Dad paid it back and I carried on working and it didn't bother me. It's just a good way to channel how angry I was about you abandoning us."

He nodded slowly. He'd thought it was odd, the way she had reacted about something like money. She called it crude, once. It bought things; it bought the happiness that her beloved nature had once proudly shown off. He'd laughed. Money was how the world carried on turning. She'd hit him.

"I'm going to pay you back," he said and even though she went to protest, he shook his head. "I am. I've got a Lily pile in my vault already. I'll pay it back." He paused. "Plus interest."

It took a moment for it to sink in but then she recalled their last conversation and with a small chuckle, she shook her head. "Okay, whatever." She pulled on one of her bracelets; simple strands of cotton woven together, a gift from one of her Muggleborn friends. "Are you going away again?"

"Me?" he asked and shook his head. "Not unless you count Manchester." He looked at her hesitantly. "Did you get the invitation?"

"Mm," she said, still yanking on her bracelet. "I couldn't get up the courage to go."

"But you wanted to?"

His voice perhaps sounded too hopeful because she looked at him a little sadly and shrugged. "You know me. Give me a shiny new flat and I'm there." He smiled because it was true. He did know her and he shook his head despairingly.

"Lils?" he asked and she couldn't even muster a scowl of annoyance to shoot at him because she'd launched herself forward and thrown her arms around her neck. He gave a short laugh and when she drew back, she pushed her glasses up and returned to fiddling with her jewellery. "I've missed you too." He leant forward and yanked on her ponytail before standing up. She looked at him quizzically. "Three down, one to go."

He didn't need to ask where Albus was. He could see the back of his grandmother's head on the patio and beyond that, down by the pond, he knew he'd find his brother. He passed Molly without a word and when he got to his brother's side, flopped down next to him. He'd had another small growth spurt in James's absence and now, they were almost level in height, nothing but the flick of James's hair in it.

They said nothing for a long time, Al yanking at the grass at their feet and James staring up at the slowly setting sun. There seemed to be no words this time. He had thought Albus would be the easiest to convince but now he wasn't so sure.

"I'm sorry," James said when the silence became too much to bear. He wanted to say more: 'I shouldn't have gone' or 'I should have come back sooner' or 'I shouldn't have come back at all' but all of them would have felt fake. Al didn't look up for a long time and James wondered whether he ought to say anything to fill the gap.

"Me too," the younger Potter said eventually and James looked across. "Six of one, half a dozen of the other, really, wasn't it?"

"You were sticking up for her."

"And you were at breaking point."

James didn't ask how his brother had known. He nodded slowly, taking in Al's words and everything else that had passed in the last few weeks. It felt like the time had flown since he'd returned' the two and a half months had brought so much with them. "We okay then?" James asked after the silence once again reached breaking point. Al looked up, squinting through his glasses and nodding.

"Course."

They shared an identical Weasley smile, toothy and broad, and James gave his brother a hefty clap on the shoulder as he pulled himself to his feet. He didn't excuse himself but made his way up to where his grandmother was pretending not to watch from the top of the garden. Only when he slid into the seat beside her did she look up and with a small smile, she patted his hand.

"I believe the term is mission accomplished," she said and he nodded slowly. He owed her more than he knew he would ever thank her for. He leant over and gave her a tight hug and a kiss on the cheek. "You look after that Ella," she said as he stood up and made to leave. "And make sure you come round for tea tomorrow. Bring her if you like."

He nodded and with a last wave to Albus, who was starting to make his way back up the garden, James made his way out of the protective spells around the building and Disapparated.

He gave Ella's flat door a quick knock when he stepped through the front door of the building but knew she'd be at work. Deadline day. Regardless, it wasn't her he was there to see and he took the stairs up to Rose's flat, letting himself in with the key he'd never given back. He called out but there was no answer and with a quick scour of the room, he sighed. The place was even more of a tip than usual and he couldn't help but laugh as he passed the flashing pieces of parchment pinned to every surface reminding her about some meeting or report or important person's address. Grabbing the pot of Floo powder, he threw some into the grate and as he stepped in, that was when he saw it.

On top of the mess on the coffee table was a box. He'd seen it before, lying on the floor by the dining table, but he'd not thought much of it. Curiosity swept through him and he stepped back out of the fireplace. He slid the lid off and stared inside at the shattered remains of something that looked like it was once beautiful. In the middle, a tag:

_D__ear Dom and Matt,_

_All the best for married life._

_Love,_

_Rose_

He groaned. Rose had at some point mentioned Louis' endeavour to fix every present that he had smashed to smithereens and this was evidently one that had stumped him. It was familiar; James knew he'd seen it before. The glass was so fine that it could have been made of film. He remembered having it in his hand, weighing no more than a feather and feeling it drop to the ground with a shatter that had shook him more than the fall of his body against the table.

He knew what it was.

Pulling his wand out and hoping his Charm work was up to scratch, he concentrated everything on the splinters and closed his eyes. The spell he knew was simple enough when one knew what exactly it was that needed repairing. He opened his eyes.

A glass ball on a thicker glass plinth that fit just perfectly in the palm of his hand; inside, a single silver heart fluttered like a leaf in a breeze that was impossible in the vacuum of the globe. He had stared enraptured then and more so now.

"You fixed it." Rose emerged from the bathroom, her dressing gown wrapped around her body, and he started. "I've been trying for weeks," she said, bending down next to him and watching the heart with the same fascination he had. "It splits," she said. "Every anniversary, the heart will split into another until it's filled with them."

"Here," he said, handing it to her but she shook her head, pressing it towards him.

"I've already given them something else," she said. "You fixed it, you give it to her."

"I can't," he said but she shook her head. He felt another wave of nerves shudder through him. If there was anyone he was scared of facing now, it was Dominique.

"You can and you will," Rose said, standing up. "Either way, you'll get out of my flat." He raised his eyebrows. "Some of us," she said, pulling her hair out of its towel and starting to dry it off, "don't need a cousin's accompaniment on a first date." He threw a screwed up ball of paper on the desk at her and stood up.

"Are you sure?" he asked, gesturing to the ball in his hand. She nodded. "Thank you."

"No problem."

"For everything."

"I said, no problem." He wrapped the ball back up in the paper and placed it in the box. Floo travel didn't lend itself too well to things that were fragile. "It's Aunt Fleur's birthday. She'll be at Shell Cottage."

He thanked her with a small nod and grabbed the Floo powder. He stepped in and with a smile, felt himself spinning past fireplace after fireplace until he landed upright in the living room of his cousins' childhood home. Shouts and screams came in from the garden and as he made his way through the kitchen, he spied Dominique racing Rémy to the end of the garden. Taking a deep breath and summoning every ounce of courage in him, he stepped outside.

The place didn't fall silent. Teddy was talking with Bill and Fleur was cooing over the baby. Victoire and Dominique's husband – James couldn't quite recall his name – were talking and only Louis seemed to pay him any sort of attention. "What's that?" he asked, nodding towards the package in his hand. The older man looked down at his hands and smiled. Louis was the only one of his cousins that he found hard to tolerate but he wasn't going to let him dampen the day.

"Wedding present," James said, opening the box and holding it up. "Picked by Rose, fixed by me." He took the globe out and held it up and only then did everybody else turn. Dominique lifted Rémy into her arms and made her way slowly up the garden, eyeing James with what seemed to be a certain level of caution that he didn't blame her for. "An apology."

He held it out to his cousin. Words had never been much fun for Dominique and he wasn't going to weigh this moment down with them now. She stared at it for a moment before putting Rémy down and taking the ball off James.

"For each year that you spend together, another heart will appear," he said, feeling wiser than he probably deserved to. "I really am sorry."

She shook her head, her eyes transfixed on the fluttering of the heart. She held it out and Louis took it from her so that she could tilt herself up on her toes and hug James tightly. "I know," she said as she let him go. "Doesn't mean I've forgiven you yet."

"Didn't expect you to," he said in reply and she laughed in understanding. "I've got to go but have a good night." She nodded and with a quick happy birthday to his aunt, James ventured back inside the house. The soft swish of the ocean had always almost been a part of the very walls of the cottage and now, there was something calling out to him. Away from the hustle and bustle of his city life, the serenity that was the peaceful moan of the sea was refreshing and he found himself walking not to the living room of the tiny cottage but down towards the beach.

The air was crisp and the waves sighed onto the sand. He remembered running and running and running until the water wouldn't let him run anymore when he was younger but now he was content to sit at the point where dry sand met wet and take it all in.

As a child, he'd never appreciated beauty. As a teenager, he had thought it only applied to women. Now, everything around him came to life in the same way his sister had always told him of. He could feel it. He could feel the sand moving through his hands, the wind on his cheeks, the whisper of a wave against the toe of his shoe.

"Knut for them?" He didn't look around but moved an arm to slip around Ella as she sank onto the sand beside him, still in her work robes. "Rose said you'd be here."

"Here?" he asked and out of the corner of his eye, he saw her waving a hand dismissively.

"Hereabouts," she said. "I saw you from the front door."

They lapsed into another silence. At that moment, he could see everything that had been and everything that was now. He could see mistakes fixing themselves, arguments resolving; it was like anything. There was no beauty in the foundations of a building, only in what it would become. He rested his head softly against Ella's and watched the sky turning a silky red above them. The sun had long slipped beneath the cover of the horizon, leaving only the elegance of a dream in its wake.

He wondered if this was the way it was meant to go, the story of how the boy became a man. He supposed not but it didn't matter because from here on in, the road was straight and narrow. He could see the rises and falls in the distance but for now, for now that was where they would have to stay.

At some point, Ella had fallen asleep against him but he resisted until the red became blue and the blue became black. His eyes fluttered shut before he could see the stars and the last thought before slumber's cloak obscured everything was that the greatest prospect he wanted in his life was that of tomorrow.

**_Fin_**


End file.
